lation for categories three and four. and then, i want to extend my appreciation to director huey again tone incentivize propert owners. he said that the fee is pretty nominal. he proposed waiving the fee so this hopefully will be another encouragement that the property owners have to take so that they won't have to submit an application fee. and then, as was read into the record, the first report to the board of supervisors will be on december 1st, 2018. so those are the key things. these are requests that came from the small business community to help deal with compliance, and if there's any questions, i'm happy to answer them. >> any questions, commissioners? no? seeing none, any members of the public wish to make a comment on item number five?

welcome. >> stephen cornell again. one thing that might be helpful is the -- something where the property owner will be compelled to tell their tenants when work is going to be done, so when they have to get this going, the building -- all of a sudden, the tenant might find their sidewalks are being torn up or something, that somehow there's some onus on the building owner to notify the tenants with some reasonable amount of time. obviously, you don't get -- you don't have the front of your store torn up overnight. they have a lot of notice on it. it would be nice that the tenant knows that ahead of time. if you can have something put into it. >> that's a good why the. thank you. >> thank you. >> any other members of the public? seeing none, public comment is

closed. i like that last comment that the public made about notification. >> okay. so that's a recommendation to -- you want to add an amendment to -- >> yes. >> and is there a time frame that you want to put before -- >> 24 hours should be significant. >> and if they're going to have to substantially alter the entryway, do you think 24 hours should be enough or should it be a couple months ahead of time? >> i think it should be more than 24 hours. >> i do, too. >> not a couple of months. maybe a month. >> a month is reasonable. >> 30 days? >> we'll call it. >> 30 days. >> 30 days. the public is saying 30 days. >> i mean, 30 kay's are traditional cycles for all kinds of decisions. >> okay. so 30-day notification.

all right. >> commissioner zouzounis: i have a question regarding material on notices that have already been sent out to businesses. they have that may deadline on it. >> so currently, yes, all notification, because this is currently law, is -- has the may 23rd, 2018 deadline on it. as we are in conversation as our office and any last week, there was a brownback. there is another brown bag at dbi. we are letting -- informing folks that the notification is being extended, but we can't officially post- it until this passes into law. >> okay. >> commissioner zouzounis: so this is a notice that says this may apply to you, so is there clear criteria for people to understand that it actually does or not on the notices that they're getting?

i mean, it -- the categories, are they flushed out a little more than just -- like -- >> correct. [ inaudible ] >> so this is sort of a simple check list. i mean, i think it's good for businesses to sort of eye. you know, what their entryway is. the property owner -- there is a very specific check list, and -- that the property owner needs to hire an engineer, an architect or a certified access specialist to fill out that check list, so it isn't just you or the property owner eyeing it and saying orche,h, e to identify one step. the check list is i'd on identifying certain barriers if they're there, and then what are going to be the proposed remediation of the barriers. >> everyone has to go through that check list even if they're not, you know -- if they don't, you know, stipulate -- or if they don't --

>> if they're a -- [ inaudible ] >> if they're a category one, it needs to be someone expert in identifying what are the code sections for accessibility to say that this entryway is in compliance. and just to note, we do have noted on dbi's site and our site not only -- we've identified from the statewide certified access specialist the dsa website, who does the certification. there's about 116 individuals that say that they work within the city and county of san francisco, so we've listed that. >> okay. good. okay. any other commissioner questions? do we have a motion to approve -- is this a -- >> it's an action item, and so it would be a motion with the

proposed amendment. >> i would motion with the notification for one month to the tenants. >> second. >> clerk: we have a motion by commissioner adams, seconded by commissioner dooley, which adds a 30-day notification to businesses if any disruptive work needs to be done. roll call. [ roll call. ] >> clerk: motion passes, 5-0. one absent. >> great. next item, please. [agenda item read]. >> r. dick-endrizzi: commissioners, there is a draft proposed letter to send to assembly member phil ting, so just a little bit of refresher on some of the background. supervisor wiener last year

passed a bill that allowed five municipalities to do a pilot program, and so san francisco has been in discussion with calrecycle to be one of the five municipalities. the department of environment in discussion with calrecycle is developing a plan. we're pretty close to having a clan that calrecycle is agreeing to should meet the criteria of kr -- the crv redemption law. so what we are proposing with the city is the in lieu fees that businesses are paying for not doing the recycling, but the $100 a day that they're paying in calrecycle, in that those fees are returned back to san francisco for us to develop the pilot program.

calrecycle is amenable to this but logistically cannot do it unless they are structurally given permission to do so. so department of environment has worked out with -- that the best way to do this is through the budget process to give authorization to calrecycle to return those in lieu fees back to san francisco to develop the pilot program. so this letter is going to phil ting to encourage him to approve that process through the budget cycle. >> commissioner zouzounis, how do you feel about this? 'cause this'll affect groecers. i want to commend you. >> commissioner zouzounis: yeah. i'm in favor of the strongest language barrier to address that structural issue that

we're facing to get the ball rolling in san francisco. the department and our office has had parallel conversations of what we need to notify the retailers of what we're doing. because i'm still getting pictures of -- hard copies of people with $13,000 invoices from the state of california, and they have no idea that the state law actually got amended or let alone that the city knows about this and is acting on it. so we need to have a parallel process to inform the retailers of this work, too. >> great. thank you. i know a woman up on potrero hill got one, too. >> yep. good life grocer. >> i have a question. what is the pilot program? do we know yet? can you share? >> r. dick-endrizzi: the pilot program still to be absolutely finalized, but what department

of environment is looking at some stationary places, but mostly, it will be mobile recycling so it will have some -- i don't know exactly how it's -- like, the physical makeup of it, but there will be a recycling thing that moves to different parts of the city and will be there on different days. so whether it might be at a safeway parking lot or somewhere else where it's easy access for individuals to be able to get to and bring their recycleables. >> and those do exist because i've actually seen those in southern, in the eastern san gabriel valley. i've seen those in la hamburbr arcadia. it's recycleables that they've been using for cans and bottles and stuff. >> this may -- we still may

have to do some land use changes to allow this. we still may have to -- there still may be some legislative changes to allow this, but i think it will meet the state laws, and i think it will help alleviate concerns from residents where -- who are close to stationary recycling centers; that you know, put the pressure on -- >> the safeways and all them are just paying the price? >> r. dick-endrizzi: yes. >> it's not been finalized yet, then? >> r. dick-endrizzi: it has not been finalized, and i think once we're able to retain those in lieu fees back, that's approximately $3 million that can sort of help give us the seed money to sort of solidify the program that needs to be developed. >> okay. thanks. >> okay. let's go to public comment.

any members of the public like to make a comment on item number six? seeing none, public comment is closed. commissioners, do we have any recommendations? commissioner zouzounis? >> commissioner zouzounis: i recommend that we support this letter and then i recommend that we follow up with a parallel process, like i mentioned, of asking the state to relieve these invoices and inform retailers. >> great. >> commissioner zouzounis: yeah. >> second? >> second. >> clerk: all right. we have a motion by commissioner zouzounis, seconded by commissioner dwight. roll call. [ roll call. ] >> clerk: motion passes, 5-0,

with one absent. >> thank you. next item, please. >> clerk: [agenda item read]. >> clerk: in your packet are the draft regular meeting minutes from march 12, 2018 and march 26, 2018. approval of the minutes can be done together or separately? >> do we have any commissioner comments on this? seeing none, do we have any members of the public would like to make comment on item number seven, minutes? seeing none, public comment is closed. do we have a motion to approve the minutes for both march 12 and march 26? >> move to approve. >> second. >> all in favor? any abstain? all in favor. >> okay. motion passes, 5-0, one absent. >> okay. next item, please. >> item eight, director's report. update and report on the office of small business and small business center, department

programs, policy and legislative matters, announcements from the mayor and announcements regarding small business activities, discussion item. >> r. dick-endrizzi: thank you. so i do have a written report under item number eight in your binder. and just for the public, there are copies in the public binder. so for the legacy business program, just wanted to highlight, we are having our meeting tomorrow with marketing and branding, and we will be getting our sort of first concepts for the logo, so that's exciting. again, we're targeting the end of june to have the logo -- finalize the logo for the small business program. the accessible business entrance program, i will be consistently putting in the

director's report presentations that our office will be giving mostly to merchant and business associations. so we are -- we will be presenting tomorrow morning to the potrero hill dogpatch merchants' association, and then, the people of park side aside -- parkside and sunset on may 3rd, and then the outer sunset merchants on may 22nd. dbi is having a brown bag. these brown bags are target at thatted towards the design professional, the engineer, the architects, the cass and property owners, and that will be this friday. and just so that you're aware, we are getting a number of calls, so in the last couple of weeks, we've received 38 calls. the majority are coming from property owners, which to me, that's a good sign that the property owners are responding to the mailing and are taking responsibility -- hopefully

taking responsibility in -- in this ordinance. and three, and then, the final -- the final thing i wanted to say but is not in the report, when rhea sent out all the notifications to do the presentation, she included the talking points, and from that, the golden gate business association and the union square bid for their news letters pulled information from the information she provided to, again, sort of publicize the accessible business entrance program, so as much -- as much information as we can get out there is good. in regards to cannabis, today was the last day, and i had forwarded to the commission last week to provide public comment on the equity incubator

rulemaking, so the rule for equity incubators. there is a rule that i want to make that i've noticed in my neighborhood commercial district around the corner from myself is on 1600 haight street, it is a very large building. there's six -- there's six commercial spaces. it's on the north side of the street at clayton and haight. there are -- >> these faces, do they have -- [ inaudible ] >> r. dick-endrizzi: clayton and haight. >> okay. >> r. dick-endrizzi: so it's on the north side, so across from the pub. >> okay. >> r. dick-endrizzi: and out of the six commercial spaces, two of them are occupied, four are vacant. this building has to undergo soft story for un, and permits have not been pulled. but two, it is in the one block on the north side of haight

street that can have cannabis retail. so i just -- i think that it -- you know, we may be seeing some of these spaces being held off the market where cannabis, the limitations of cannabis retail can happen. so i just -- to me, that was an interesting sort of conversion with both soft story and where cannabis retail can be on haight street. small business week, the last week commissioner yee riley, you had asked for information. so president adams, i will also extend an opportunity to you, if you want to speak about small business week this year. but to highlight, may 14th is opening our opening of small business week. we will have it at the metreon. we're back at the metreon, but

we're changing the format. it will be a panel presentation will be the key feature of the evening. right now, we have lisa fetterman, the ceo and founder of nomoku. and then, sam mona -- mcgannan, founder of buy-rite. and they are we are schroedingsolidifying our moderator. our opening night will no longer be a resource fair but will be an insuperioring evepi

hearing from small business owners, medium size business owners who are inspirational and growing within the city. >> and we will have food, too, at this event. buy-rite is coming in, and they're bringing some other people that they know that are going to provide the catering for this. >> r. dick-endrizzi: and it is more limited, so there are -- it won't be as large of an audience as we've had in the past. then tuesday, we have our annual board of supervisors ceremony at 2:30, and the golden gate business association has their megamake contact, the women mean business mixer. so in the evening will be affiliate events with tga, the women mean business mixer with the renaissance center, and the national association of

business women owners. wednesday, we are doing the awards -- the small business awards in the morning, and we'll be doing a breakfast at the green room across the street. we decided to shift that to the morning because we're having more affiliate events, and so we thought it would be good to open up our evenings to allow for more of the affiliate events to take place. so we will be having the small business awards, and again, tentative, that would be where the mayor might present his awards. the sba awardee, and this year, pg&e has a green business award in partnership with department of environment. and then, the sfeda has their award. then, in the evening we have the latino business mixer with meta and then tech after dark with the chamber at sf city and

airbnb. on thursday, bay area bunk or brews, this is a vet organization, so it is veteran owned small business organizations with we work, will be having their event. the san francisco african american entrepreneurs mixer is happening at hazel's southern bar and kitchen, and this is hosted by main street launch, and hosted by the african american chamber and the bayview-hunters point entrepreneurship. and then saturday, we are having our shop and dine in the 49. and 15 of our merchant associations from signed up fore the sidewalk encroachment fee waiver. >> i think that's a record, too. >> r. dick-endrizzi: it is. there may be more merchant areas participating in the shop and dine event that will be more than just the sidewalk sales, so -- >> for the fee waiver on that,

that sounds like two years ago, there was legislation, we don't need to go through the fee waiver any more for this. >> this is for the awning and lighting. >> is that again for the month of may? >> r. dick-endrizzi: that is again for the month of may. and i have debated about doing a waiver because any yo if this year, we would be doing a saturday event. >> right. >> r. dick-endrizzi: so if that is something that's fairly consistent, then we'll write a legislation just to allow -- >> and do we have somebody that's going to sponsor that right now? >> r. dick-endrizzi: we don't. i'm finalizing the drafting, and then we'll look -- we'll have somebody. so you'll have that legislation at your next meeting for you to review. and then, i've included the sponsorships. we are at budget, and we've met

our budget, a little over our budget, just barely. but adam has done a good job again this year with bringing in our sponsors. so moving onto lemgislation, nw legislation that's introduced, i've printed out for you some copies for you to take home, to read. supervisor peskin has introduced cannabis retail, medical cannabis retail in chinatown, and that is to prohibit the cannabis retail and medical dispensaries in chinatown mixed use districts. supervisor safai has introduced legislation allowing catering as an accessory use in neighborhood commercial districts, so this would allow -- open up more spaces where restaurants are dark in the morning during the day. they're only open for the evenings to be able to have their kitchens open for

catering -- for caterers to use. >> and then, under the police code, required agreements tweens cannabis businesses and labor organizations. so if you recall, the initial legislation that was passed required a labor piece considering-let's see: i put this as the top piece of your legislation, but this proposed legislation -- so currently, all cannabis businesses must allow their employees to abide by a labor peace agreement. they cannot prevent any unionizing. what there will be adding to the permit application is for applicants with ten or more more employees, each applicant

must demonstrate either of the following, that they will abide by the terms of the labor peace agreement or that the applicant has entered into a collective bargaining agreement with a bona fide labor organization. so that's a little unusual that we have -- we have put such kinds of stipulations into an application process for businesses, small businesses, so i wanted to bring that to your attention. and then -- so those will be -- i'll be working to schedule those within the next commission meeting or after. and then, a few updates on items that you've heard. so the massage establishments on union street, allowing those as conditional use, that's

still to be scheduled in committee. the jackson square uses -- restaurant and bar uses, that was passed by the board of supervisors on 3-6. and the health code banning of the animal furs and products, so it will amended in committee to ban manufacturing of animal fur products except for when the fur is sourced from used products. the sustainability clause that the commission recommended be added to the legislation did not make it in. and then, i wanted to follow up with the legislation that you heard considering the criminal history of employment. this commission approved it. it did make a recommendation that if the penalties -- our penalties are less than the

state fines and penalties, that should be adjusted. in review, the state doesn't have set penalties or fines. i guess if they do find that a business has erred, then, those fines or penalties are somehow configured based upon what the penalties and errors are. so the penalties -- the fines and penalties as proposed in the legislation stands. so that -- and then i've just listed a few things that we're going to be focusing on for the quarter with, again, hiring for the commission secretary, small business week, working on soft story t.a., continued outreach for the accessible business entrance, and transitioning the business portal to osb and then

relocating our office into room 140. >> that'll be good. have we posted for the position yet? >> r. dick-endrizzi: we will be posting, yes. >> okay. >> what does that mean, transition to osb to business portal? >> r. dick-endrizzi: so right now, the team that jane gang has 'emabled has been doing all the technical upgrades and has been managing the content. so if we needed any content changes, we've been working with that team to make it. you will be receiving a presentation soon from jason and the team. we are just about at the end of completing i think over 100 forms. not all of them are applications but forms, so that they can be submitted on-line, as along with align payments

for the portal. that will be the last sort of big project with the portal, and once that's completed, then carol will be managing the content -- will be taking over the content management of the business portal. >> it will be our job to maintain it? >> r. dick-endrizzi: mm-hmm. maintaining the content. if there's technical upgrades, then we would still work with the department of technology on that. >> okay. so that team's still a separate team; it's not part of osb. >> r. dick-endrizzi: right. they're a team that works specifically with osb and oewd on our projects. >> okay. >> commissioner zouzounis? >> commissioner zouzounis: thanks for those updates. can you clarify the lower polk street alcohol restricted use district since i'm curious because we did run into an issue with the restricted use districts on third street where a business just moved down the street after they lost their lease. so is there a way that we can

include, you know, relocation on the same corridor or something? >> r. dick-endrizzi: umm -- >> commissioner zouzounis: so they don't have to -- [ inaudible ] >> r. dick-endrizzi: i'm sorry. i glossed over that. i will -- it was reintroduced. it was heard at the planning commission. i know there was discussion allowing relocation within 18 months within the corridor. >> commissioner zouzounis: okay. that's good. >> r. dick-endrizzi: so i'll look for -- >> commissioner zouzounis: if that can be amended some way, i would like to. >> okay. any other commissioner questions before we go to public comment? okay. do we have any members of the public that would like to make a comment on the director's report? seeing none, public comment is closed. this is a discussion item. any other questions? and i'm really looking forward to small business week this year. it's -- a lot of change up, a

lot of new things, but a lot more activities, so -- >> r. dick-endrizzi: and i'm sorry, and i did miss one thing about small business week, excuse me, president adams. we are doing the conference again, and the sba is -- as with last year, is running and managing the conference at their offices, so their workshops are happening all week. we're very excited about that, and it proved to be a good thing last year with -- we had good attendance with the workshops being at the sba office. >> maybe we can post that somewhere, too. 'cause they had classes, and we got some really good classes. >> r. dick-endrizzi: so tomorrow i think we'll get the final at our meeting, and then, i can submit that -- a copy to the commission -- the list of workshops. and then, those are up on, i

think the small business week website. >> great. thank you. >> and you said may 14 -- the evening of may 14 is the kickoff event. >> r. dick-endrizzi: yes. >> will you -- >> r. dick-endrizzi: we will not have a commission meeting, and we are -- i had sent out an e-mail. we will not be able to have a commission meeting. i was given the wrong information about the availability of this room or any of the other hearing rooms for monday, may 7th. so there is an alternate date that we're working with, and i'll have that for you tomorrow. >> i can do monday, may 7th. >> r. dick-endrizzi: unfortunately, there are no rooms available monday, may 7th. so -- and then, there's the same thing for the week of may 28th, which is the fourth monday, but that is memorial day, so i will be sending out notification of alternative

dates. >> okay. okay. any other questions for the commissioner -- i mean, for the director? seeing none, next item, please. >> clerk: item nine, commissioner's reports. allows president, vice president and commissioners to report on recent small business activities and make announcements that are of interest to the small business community, discussion item. >> okay. i don't have anything to report as of today. any other commissioners have reports? >> likewise, nothing here. >> okay. any members of the public who would like to make a comment on item number nine? seeing none, public comment is closed. item ten, new business -- >> commissioner zouzounis: before we move on, i think -- [ inaudible ] >> oh, maryann. >> we did not adjourn yet. we have new business. >> mr. president, could we --

>> hang on. i know what to do. so item ten is new business, so if you'd like to -- we have a -- it's not -- it's -- so under new business, we'd like to talk about pop up on may 8th. >> we were seeing if we could make you wait the entire duration. >> good afternoon, commissioners. for the record my name is mary ann mazucco thompson with the office of workforce development, and may 8th, we will have a pop up, and it will be our third pop up annually. last december, it was funded by square, so i'm going to let square make this presentation because i just want to say to

everybody, if you have to pick a business partner to work with on any project, it's definitely square. they make our job so much easier. so i'm going to step aside and first, i'm going to introduce dan swislow who's with square, and then aaron archuleta. >> hi. >> dan swislow. i'm going to tell you a little about square and then aaron is going to tell you a little about the pop up. square is a san francisco founded business. we're on market street. our cofounders founded the company back in 2009. one of our cofounders was a glass artists, and he tried to sell a piece, and he didn't sell the piece because he didn't take card readers. our two cofounders came up with a tech shop in the bay area,

which was a maker's space, and built that proceed totype with the belief that people should have access to the financial services they need. the first user of the square reeder w reader was lily bell, an office in hart plaza. the premise has stayed the same. we started with card reader but offer small business loans. we offer software and data analytics, employee or payroll management, a number of different tools. in fact when we went public at the end of 2015, we brought sherry, the owner of lily bell the flower cart in new york to help us ring the opening bell at the new york stock exchange. these businesses are the heart and soul of our businesses, which is why we're happy to partner with all of you on these businesses. >> and this was our second pop up together. it's been so much fun. it's the opportunity to have

more than 40 businesses from every single supervisor's district who make themselves, their products, to come and sell and celebrate their work. we actually had close to 1 is 00 applicants. it's free to the businesses who participate, and we're on-site there as square, so if they would like support. the golden gate cookie company were there, and they had never taken credit cards before that date, and that day, they were able to. i am also a small business owner. i own a business out in bernal heights, and we've been thoughtful in making sure that every district is represented and everyone has an opportunity regardless of what they're making and it's a really diverse make up. we would invite you all to come and shop. it's going to be a lot of fun. it's in may, may 8th, so that's

in advance of all the graduations, mother's day, father's day and weddings. is so really capturing the opportunity to get those people through the door and celebrating san francisco. anything else, mary ann 1234. >> commissioner dwight will be there. we would encourage you all to come. square does a great job of -- they'll walking through the pop up and introduce you to the different makers, and they know all of them, and they can tell you a little bit about, like, how the businesses got started, so it would be great as a small business commission if you guys joined us, let us know, and they'll be happy to take you on a walk-through. we also want you to purchase things. >> what is the time on may 8th? >> it's 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., so come during your lunch hour, if you can. we'd be delighted to give you a tour. >> it's a tuesday. how are you guys promoting this. >> oh, all over. the chamber has been fully

promoting, we've been fully promoting. we had great attendance for the holiday one. >> yeah. we do -- so we did an add buy, which is actually a partnership with abc 7. we do a whole buyout of their website and all of their social media. we've been promoting it on social media, the chamber has been promoting it. sf made -- by the way, this is going to be the signature event for sf made week, so a big partner of sf 345imade, but al they're doing a lot of the pushout. >> you have a legacy branding committee meeting that day, and i will be manning my booth. fyi. >> i can't wait to see you. >> do you do any outreach or promotion in different languages, like chinese or

spanish? >> the outreach is done in all four languages. we don't traditionally do an ad buy in the local newspapers. we don't see quite the same return on investment. the other nice thing is with hood line, we get a lot of data analytics back, and it drives a lot of track to the shop and dine in the 49 website. >> is there going to be anything by direct mail or e-mail? >> so a lot of e-mail, a lot of one-on-one outreach. >> merchant association? >> all the merchants' associations. i don't know if you're aware of this, but the city hall pop up, the first one last may was one of the first events here at city hall in which the department of human resources actually sent out an e-mail to every city employee, encouraging them to attend. and then, secondary to that, we

reached out to all the department heads who amplified it through their employees outreach. it's got a very robust outreach in terms of everyone we do outreach to has their own personal touch. >> anymore questions? and of course we've got to go to public comment. any member of the public who would like to make a comment on the pop up shop? seeing no comment, public comment is closed. i i went to an art walk -- that's where i met you taz at the art walk. i think i bought a shirt in that store. >> yeah, exactly. >> that was a good night. there was a lot of people on a friday night, out in mission bernal. >> the neighborhood is very supportive. >> yes. >> yeah, thank you. >> thank you very much. >> you know, we like these

neighborhood people getting involved. this is what it's all about. this is how i got my start, so -- >> yeah, exactly. it's important. >> good for you. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you for presenting. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> okay. any other new business? commissioner dooley? >> commissioner dooley: i would like to follow up on the public comments requesting clarification by the zoning ad stror regarding how internet companies should be regarded when they open brick and mortar locations. are they formula retail? is there a financial threshold where an internet company will be considered formula retail when opening brick and mortar. >> okay. >> commissioner dooley: so that's my request, is that we ask for some clarification. >> that's a good one. okay. any other -- any other commissioner comments? we already did public comment, correct? >> mm-hmm. >> okay.

okay. next item, please. >> clerk: sfgov tv, please show the office of small business slide. >> okay. our custom to begin and end each small business commission meeting with a reminder that the office of small business is the only place to start your new business in san francisco and the best place to get answers to your questions about doing business here in san francisco. and again, if you want to voice your concerns about policies that affect the economic vitality of small businesses in san francisco, please let us know, and you know it all starts here at the office of small business. thank you. >> clerk: item 11, adjournment, action item. >> do we have a motion to adjourn? >> motion. >> second. >> all in favor? >> okay. commission closed. motion passes, 5-0, one absent.

. >> welcome. good morning, everybody. thank you for coming out on another amazing sunny day here

in the city of san francisco. i want to thank you here for being on this critically important topic. you know, last year was a very challenging year for our residents here in san francisco and for our visitors and everyone else who parked their cars on the streets of san francisco. nearly 31,000 cars were broken into in 2017 in our city, which is a crazy number. a total of 25% increase over the year before. and let me say i'm going to be the first to tell everybody and to make sure the residents of san francisco know that we believe that this is completely unacceptable. the status quo on our streets is completely unacceptable, and we have to do things better. our city cannot continue to thrive if people are afraid to leave their car unattended when they're here to live, when they're here to work, when they're here to shop or visit any of our amazing attractions here in san francisco. as i said many times before, parking your car in san

francisco should not be a game of roulette. and i will say that since becoming mayor and previously as a member of the board of supervisors, i was the first one -- one of the first people to point out the problem and to acknowledge the problem, though, and i think it's critically important. and also to acknowledge the work that our police department has done in response to this epidemic that we are seeing and we have seen in our streets beginning really in earnest last year. and the first to commend our police department for the efforts that they have done. you know, chief scott did not point fingers or blame others or make excuses. our police department went to work. last year at the end, they doubled our foot patrols here in san francisco, creates a unit specifically to deal with property crimes in san francisco, and we dedicated more resources at our district stations to report and investigate these crimes.

and today as you've seen in the papers, we're proud to announce that there are results from some of these efforts. for the first three months of 2018, we have seen an over 17% decrease in our auto break-ins. we are seeing real progress. but again, the status quo is not okay on our streets, and as a city, we are not going to rest on our laurels. we have a ton of work left to do. we will continue effective, targeted campaigns to address this challenge. so today, we're doing a few things. first of all, we are rolling out officially across the entire city of san francisco, our park smart campaign. what you see on the bus behind us, it will provide more informational resources to our residents and to our visitors. we are canvassing our car burglary hot spots and posting public messages throughout the city of san francisco that if you love it, don't leave it.

and i want to thank in particular kelly nice and his entire team for their work on this advertising campaign. we do not want to give thieves the opportunity to take possessions in our cars. and i want to say this is a very coordinated effort between our police department, numerous city agencies, our community partners, and officials from the tourism industry. this initiative is a key part of our effort to make sure crimes don't occur in the first place, and i'm going to quote chief scott in saying a crime prevented is much better than a crime solved. we are complementing these efforts as well with greater resources fore investigative teams. today we're expanding new efforts to expand fingerprint training at our different police stations throughout the city of san francisco. some three dozen members of the captain's staff from all police

stations will have fingerprint training. they'll be joining our officers on the force who already have these skills, and by expanding these services and this training, we're going to expand our fingerprint database, providing new resources to crack down on car break-in offenders, and particularly those who are serial offenders, and we've seen some of them being caught in our papers over the last few weeks. we know these measures, however, together are simply not going to solve the car break-in epidemic here in san francisco, we they are important next steps and important next steps to residents of the city, to visitors of the city to make sure they know and everybody knows that we are moving forward, and we recognize the issue and we are going to continue to do more. this approach is also going to include additional staffing in our police department. earlier this year, i asked chief scott to conduct an internal staffing analysis within the police department so

we can determine the resources that we need within our police department to make sure we tackle this epidemic. let me say this very loud and clear: we have some of the best police officers in the country. the men and women that serve us in the san francisco we should be incredibly proud of, and we need to give them our respect every single day. they put our lives on the line to protect us here in san francisco, but we need more of them, and i am committed to funding additional increases in our police department as we roll through our upcoming budget season here in san francisco. i am also urging our criminal justice partners, our judicial branch, our public defender and district attorney to work together on our proposal to have one judge specifically dedicated to auto break-ins. we need to make sure that there are consequences to the actions that are happening on our streets. like the other major issues facing our city, we are not going to solve this alone or with one single solution. by exploring a wide range of options and by collaborating

together, we are going to make -- and let me say this, we are going to continue to make significant progress in this area. i want to close by thanking a number of different people and groups who have been involved -- first of all, chief scott, to you in particular, to the entire police department, many of which are behind me today, to our 311 department, to the office of economic and workforce development, to our department of emergency management, to our office of short-term rentals, sf travel, and the partnership with our tourism industry, our community partners today, like troy from our fisherman's chafsh community benefits district. i mentioned kelly nice, but i'm going to mention him again, from nice advertising. thank you for their incredible help. and everyone else in the entire city family and every single

resident that is demanding that we make san francisco and we are working to make san francisco a much safer place for everyone. so thank you all for being here today, and with that i would like to introduce the chief of our police department, chief bill scott. [applause]. >> first of all, let me say thank you to mayor farrell for the leadership that he's providing on this issue. as you stated, collaboration is the key. it takes all of us working together to fight crime. to my left, i have some of san francisco's finest, our police officers from central station. we have our community, troy, and members of our community. we have our parking department here. it's a collaborative effort. no one entity can take on this issue alone, and we are so proud that we do have collaborative partners in this city. we're thrilled to be working with our fellow city agencies, our community ners, our leaders in the tourism industry, and we as a police department, as i said, we can't do it alone. that said, the news that the mayor just reported is very encouraging. but in addition to that, i'd like to point out, too, first

three months of this year, our homicides are down by almost one-third. our burglaries are down, and we know as the mayor stated that our auto burglaries are down, and we will not rest on our laurels. those of us that have been in this business know that we have more work to do. now the mayor has outlined some steps that we have already taken, but i want to put some context to what that means in terms of the drop in auto burglaries. we're talking about 17% for the first three months of the year. that's over 1,000 less victims, 1,000 crimes that we believe were prevented. doubling our foot patrols, we know that especially hads deter crimes, and these officers standing behind me are some of the best in what they do. we've reallocated resources towards our property crimes. last week, those investigators

put together a spring of investigations that led to the arrest of several serial burglars in our city and the region. i want to go back to something that the mayor said and something that you'll hear me say over and over again. when we talk about crime and particularly auto burglaries, prevention is the key. prevention is the key. we're asking people not to make themselves easy prey. make no mistake, we're not blaming people for being victimized. that is not what we're trying to do here. this is about doing everything possible to keep your property safe and to avoid being an easy target for somebody who's willing to take your belongings. the park smart message isn't just a reminder to drivers, it's a reminder to those that want to prey on others that we still have police officers that will make arrests.

we still have undercover plain clothes officers doing surveillance. we still have a district attorney that are going to charge those crimes. we still have prisons, and we still have jails. that is a a part of law enforcement that will never go away, but we want to turn the tide a little bit because those things are very important, and we will continue to do them, but we have to put more emphasis on prevention. we talked about the fingerprinting, and the mayor mentioned this. you know, we've had a lot of good arrests, and we know we need to increase our fingerprinting capabilities, so as the mayor said, we're training 36 personnel to do just that. we're encouraging people if they do have an auto burglary, go get your car fingerprinted. we need to get those fingerprints in our databases so we can help solve some of these crimes. in addition to that, with the mayor's leadership and guidance, we hope to have more officers in the field.

we encourage the public, if you see something, say something. we encourage you to call us when you see these type of crimes or any type of crimes being committed. together, we will continue to make this city safer for everyone. again, i'd like to thank mayor mark farrell for his support and his leadership on this issue. we could not do this without strong leadership, and that's what it's going to take is leadership from all of us to turn the tide on these crimes and make our city safer. thank you. [applause]. >> and with that, i'd like to introduce actually one of the two people that helped create the park smart slowigan, and that's commander david lozar. >> well, i want to begin by thanking our mayor, mark farrell, and our chief david scott. a little history about park smart. back in 2014, i served as the

captain of central station, paying very close attention to all the auto burglaries that are that were taking place, and as the chief has mentioned, arresting those responsible is a primary duty of ours, but what's equally or more important is prevention, the message that those that come to our city, who enjoy our city, the mer chapters and the residents and the visitors to simply keep their car empty. it was back then, supervisor mark farrell, district two, we worked together on putting ambassadors up on lombard street, and they had a goal of messages all the visitors coming through about leaving their cars empty. i'm sure mark farrell, you remember when we worked on that, and thanks to you, we got the ambassadors up on lombard street educating everyone. but i went to my police advisory board at central station about needing their help, and the community is very important in education and

crime prevention messages. and i went to troy campbell who's the executive director of the fisherman's wharf district. and i said troy, we have to get a message that catches people's attention as they come through. we thought about park smart, and so locally here, we put up our signs, letting visitors know they need to keep their cars empty while visiting san francisco. we're excited today because our mayor and our chief have decided to roll this out citywide, and inviting the marketing person -- marketing people that definitely contributed, the nice marketing firm, as you see the bus behind us. we're taking it to a whole new level in 2018. so we're grateful, we're grateful for all of our community partners. we're grateful that we're able to get the message out on crime prevention, and as we work on

getting the message out of crime prevention, you can see the results that are taking place. with that we'd like to invite up our community partner, the executive director troy campbell, who was behind this from the beginning, to say a few words. thank you very much. [applause]. >> good morning. so again, another round of thank yous, but thank you, mayor farrell, chief scott, commander lozar for making this a public service announcement. i would also like to thampg the d.a.'s office because we were awarded a neighborhood justice fund grant last year that helped us produce more of those materials. when park smart message was skeeved by the central station police community advisory board, it relied on cid, dic's, community organizations, all to put up the money to produce these materials and share them in their respective areas, however the goal was always to t