of life rather than a crime. they tried to pat me on the head and brush me off. when i asserted myself the one working the case desorted to dynamics similar to rape. i remember when he informed me that dna from two men was found on my body and talked over me dismissively. [bell ringing] failing rape victims. we are kept in rooms without service to call our friends or family without information during the worst moments of our lives and no one is taking our

dna or checking on us. we are cast aside and told that rape is complicated. i read the law sympu ciphers, it complicated. i know the facts and evidence and it's a fact and abhor rent and a disgrace but it isn't complicated. the police wrote a warrant for arrest around two years ago. my case has been sitting at the district attorney's office since then languishing and they tell me they believe me and that i have done everything right but they do nothing, no arrest, no prosecution, the rapist and his accomplices remain free to prey on women and to hunt us for support.

predators are embolden by the consequence free status of their crime. we need you to act. we need to hold departments and mepredators accountable, sf general, the da and the medical examiner, everyone needs to do better and they need to collaborate. their failing us. the damage of being discarded by our city departments cuts to the core. oh, and so that you are aware i med a advocate with the national organization of women from manhattan through my brother who is a prosecutor in new york and she is now advocating for at least a half of dozen of us who have been raped in san francisco

due to lack of ad advocacy here. this is a public health and safety crisis and will only get worse if you our leaders do not commit to reform. >> supervisor stefani: thank you so much. >> one last note thank you specifically to supervisor ronen and her office and supervisor stefanny, i ant so grateful to your leadership. >> supervisor stefani: these are just intense emotional stories and i can't express enough gratitude for you to come out and share these stories and unfortunately we have the rule that we have to give the same amount of time to speak and

there is a lot of items on the agenda after this and parents have to pick up their kids after school, so i'm so sorry we will have to limit public comment to two minutes per minute. thank you so much. next speaker please. >> i am here on behalf of a father of a rape survivor in san francisco. in the absence of a murdered victim or brutally beaten the crime of rape is treated differently than other crimes of violence and the victims of rape are being treated like second-class citizens. whether it's the perpetrators who buy their way out of justice or elite perpetrators caught on

top of the victim who get a slap on the wrists the their victims being let down. politicians and celebrities and men in positions of power are finally be brought to justice but the system is still faulty and antiquated and needs the eyes, ears and resourceses to see that not one victim is left behind. in the face of the system's failure i urge to stand up for justice and all victims and support and fund the sharp program. a tough former prosecutor and now retired gunnel in my jurisdiction who i know very well recently was quoted in the paper describes how she received a call from her adult son telling about his victimization from a clergyman many years ago

and she described it as the worst day in her life. stand up to victims. >> i am here to have a spiritual place where we can dpw t go to someplace to talk. if we go to police department and we don't get a good service we need to go to a special place to put our complaints. i think this idea to have a special place with a person who can help me to solve this problem is good and strongly needed. even if we have a place to help these people who have a lot of problems and sometimes we go

with to the department policemen and they don't have us. where can i go with my complaint and who can help me with this. please get this idea to have a special place and i have to say thank you because you are trying to lead this. we need great help. to everybody and many womens who are trying to get some kind of help we are struggling with idea to please support this idea that we need t have some good knew about this to help us with this problem. >> thank you. >> my name is rachel and it's

been 4.5 years since i was drugged and raped and -- for some reason the police investigation is still opened. message from all agencies i saw to the point -- i still haven't seen my toxicology report. we had to continue in civil court without it. victims like myself need sharp and no other one has intervened in cases like mine -- this is not a jurisdiction or a woman's jurisdiction it's not within their reach. no one has extended anything to the massive problem but sharp

and 4.5 years into this, half of my 20s gone panned this is the e first time i have seen something that will help cases and this is truly what victims want. thank you. >> i will have a translation. >> i am lisa sanchez and i am a sex worker and also a survivor of sexual assault and i am here

because i want to speak in support of this issue and i think what is already happening to survivors is that the indifference from the city is hardth parhe t violence and the abuse they are experiencing. i have a lot of mixed emotions that everybody is talking about makes me remember my own assault and all the indifference that we are feeling with authorities is part of what makes me feel uncomfortable.

i also want to include a suggestion that we need to make sure that the office staff is diverse so people from different backgrounds can connect with people in the office. it's difficult that people don't imagine what kind of impact this will have in their lives once it's happening. thank you. >> i it shouldn't be okay

that because i am a sex worker that someone comes and violates me. when i say no, it means no. >> good afternoon my name is erica rodriguez from the women's collective. i am here because i want to support that the sexual assault office happened immediately so that we have more help for victims when they are ignored or mistreated by different departments because we need our voices to be heard and we need to stop this violence.

thank you. >> good afternoon my name is maria sanchez from the women's collective. i support the opening of these sexual assault office immediately. to ensure that we have more support for supervisors when they are ignored or mistreated by any department in the city. there are times when our cases are untouched and completely forgotten. i would like it for this office

to open immediately. >> my name is mary fitzgerald and i am a family support manager. thank you to supervisors and supervisor ronen for sponsoring this. i am here today with a perspective as many folks today as a survivor and service provider. my own personal story at the age of 14 i experienced assault and i didn't receive any toxicology report nor did my parents, and ten years later received a call from special victims unit at 850 bryant letting me know they had finally processed my kit and if i wanted to move forward with

any action. again that was ten areas and that is unacceptable. unfortunately my story is similar to many stories out there especially those of the families that we serve. so i wanted to speak out and ask you to support this measure and ask that sharp is adequately and equitably funded so meaningful action can be taken. things to consider is making sure that it's equitably represented and that language barriers around english with a second language folks receive equitable care and response.

>> my name is audrey martinez and i am here to support this office of victims assault and harassment. i have been through sexual assaults through my whole life and tired to be told that it is my fault for embracing feminism. where do i go when i need support. i am still sexually harassed even after so much belongings and propertyaken a way from me. i am a queer man who has gone through a lot of and even a lot of therapy sessions. i support this office for men and women who have gone through sexual assault to be a

productive citizen for a healthy environment. >> my name is bianca and i am a friend of jane doe. >> no parent should have to receive a phone call that i received from my child and the moment was froze in what i was doing. i am so proud of her. her strength is added mile an a. she continues to share her sto story. her rapist walks the streets meanwhile jane doe lives in constant pain. this man has been empowered by the lack of arrest, prosecution

and injustice. i have no doubt that his activity continues. no woman should have to wait for hours for processing, jane do did. a woman who suggests that the video tapes be secured immediately should not be ignored and jane doe's was. prosecutors and changed and there is m no prosecution. my daughter's life is defined by this rape and she suffers ptsd. in the home she grew up in she cannot sit with her back to an open space. please facilitate the funding to help women recover and you cannot imagine the pain that is with each of us in jane doe's

family it's there every day and every night. please, please help women victims thank you. >> i want to say thank you to supervisor ronen on reading the way on this important life changing legislation for helping create the sharp office. i wanted to come and speak tod today. i was born and raised in the city and i am still living here. at the house party i was tooken and thrown in a car and raped and shortly after like hours after i contacted one of my friends who actually was on the youth commission when this happened and they met me at

general hospital and i went through the rape trauma center to collect the dna and all that stuff and did all the processes because that is what i was told i was supposed to do and as someone who was a city commissionerrer at the time i had to go through the steps and still to this day i haven't gotten a call and never gotten a call back from general hospital and no one ever contacted me and you all are probably the second people that i told my, my life because the only other person that knew was the friend that i told me to meet at general hospital so i want to thank you for all your leadership. thank you. >> i am the soa advocacy directr

and i've been hired to advocate for women survivors. we see about 350 rape case as year which is almost double the 131 reported rapes in previous years and as we know it's a very unreported crime. the establishment in a city office exclusively focused on sexual assault and harassment is very important and i support this wholeheartedly. the women's building is committed to working with community partners, city government and all women identified individuals. i urge the supervisors to move this issue forward. i want to thank hillary ronan for her leadership and bring

attention to the women that were here. i don't see many men in the audience and that is part of the problem and why this issue has been ignored and put under the radar because women ove often he the voice and agency and this will do a small part in remed remedying that. thank you. [bell ringing] >> good afternoon. i am not a victim of sexual assault i do want to thank supervisor ronen for always being on the right side of issues. i am a broadcaster that broadcasts to the l latino

community. i have heard a lot of stories and a lot of women are afraid to come forward because even though they are a sanctuary city they don't feel safe and they have even a worse problem and listening to jane doe's problem remind me of my niece who was being sexually harassed by her neighbor but when she went to the police here many the mission they dismissed her and said it's okay don't worry about it and it wasn't unti until her father intervened several times that the man stopped. for too long women have been dismissed and not been believed and ignore ignored and subjectee humiliation and disaren't. i want to support the office of

sexual harassment so we can all start healing and help survivors of this hideous crime come forward without having to feel like they are going to be victimized again. rape kits are not tested in a timely manner, it's indefensible and we need it now. we need to come out of the dark ages. >> marcella rodriguez, i keep working going into classrooms and makes presentations on dating violence and sexual violence for high sol

students. students. when i do that kid ask me what should i do and i give them the resources that i have and i have a list of therapists and lawyers and providers they can go to. every time i do that, i'm like yes, i am doing what i can but i know along the way something is going to happen and likely they are not going to get the services they deserve. it's really hard to talk to kids and tell them that because i cannot just lie to them and say oh, go and speak your truth and justice is going to be made when that is not the truth. i am here to ask you to please go forward with this project because we really need the support of the city and we need kid and everybody to be sure that once they speak up they are going to actually be heard.

that's it. thank you. >> my name is whitney. thank you for inviting me. i am here to support the office of sharp. it needs to happen for sexual assault survivors. i was raped here in san francisco in 2010 and it was my first year of graduate school. i experienced so much trauma during this time period that i didn't even realize that until years later that i had been sexually harassed by my own police detective. his job was to protect me but instead my trust was shattered repeteth and my voice silenced. photographs were used as evidence that the sex between my rapist and i was consensual

because thibutthis was not the . hwhen i was at san francisco general i calledded my professor and told her what happened to me. i was in complete shock and standing there in my hospital gowns. after the exam i drove myself home and the next morning i had a reaction to the rape kit medicine. i was outside of my apartment looking for my car and it had been towed. i fell on to me knees and i was sobbing and i called 9 911 and e operator told me to get a taxi. the reason i am telling you this is there was the office of sharp where victims can communicate their feelings and be

understood. >> [speaking spanish] >> translator, i have to tell you that living through this is horrible. in looking for help in organizations sometimes it's really hard because a lot of organizations actually make you feel guilty sometimes like it's your fault what happened.

that's why i am supporting the establishments of this office of sexual assault as soon as possible. so that those of us who are actually victims of sexual assault can't be ignored anymore from other departments in the city. so that we can actually move forward with our lives and have people that can support us something like the office that you are trying to open. thank you. >> good afternoon jordan davis speaking in support of creating the office of sexual harassment

and assault prevention. in my life i have survives my instances of sexual harassment and assault from too much teachers, strangers on the street and politicians in two different states. i don't want to go into them because it is numb to me so much and so upsetting, but i don't like to go to the police as a disabled transgendered woman and this office is sorely needed. i think about the national reck anyone that the me too movement has created. i sometimes ge get nervous walkg to city hall given the sexual assault cases that have happened and ta experiences that i have had and with great power comes

great responsibility and it's necessary to make sure city government is held accountable. i have a policy with not meeting with any male supervisors in a room alone due to all that has happened across the countries and because of my experiences and i want to close this by saying on a personal note i don't like it when men touch me and given the physical nature of politics i want to say just don't do it. we need to make sure this office is created immediately and funded funded a quatly so people me can feel comfortable dealing with things at that level. thank you. >> my name is jesse da santos.

indiscernible. i know that you have heard this over and over and i though this is going to help us to open this office and to feel more comfortable and this is not going to resolve the problem but this is going to help us so much with this problem and i really appreciate your time. thank you. >> good afternoon immar a ta and i am from the women's collective. i am in support of the opening of this sexual assault office. thank you.

>> good afternoon i am from the women's collective. >> translator: i have seen members of my family that have gone through sexual assault and every time the case hasn't moved forward and nothing has happened at any level and there is a lot of fear in the community and a lot of discrimination and we

need to do something about it. it would be a big help for everybody without discrimination of any bac background to have ts office. thank you. >> >> translator: i support the

opening of this office and it's important to do it immediately and to be able to support sexual assault survivors. i also have a lot feelings that are stuck in my chest and i feel like i can't even speak. i have a lot of family members including kids that have gone through abuse since they were very small. sometimes what happens is that other family members when they hear that this person was abused, they tell them that they shouldn't speak up. sometimes the assailants threaten them to not speak to

say i will kill you or i will do something to your mother if you speak up about what i have done. i have many stories that are actually real, actual family members of mine that have gone through this, so i ask you to please open this office and ensure we are helping survivors. thank you. >> good afternoon my name is tiffany and i am a survivor of sexual assault. about two years i was drugged and raped here in san francco by a co-worker and i eventually went to general hospital and got a rape kit done and decided to make a police report. i met with the invest gator and i want to read you a quotement she said what do you want out of this? i replied i want this person to

accept responsibility for their actions. she responseth well after what you told me alcohol played a big role in all of this and i think everyone involved needs to accept responsibility for their actions. she said that to me the very first and only meeting we had. you know rape, sexual assault and harassment is traumatizing and i am still dealing with that more, but what is more additionally traumatizing is when you go to the people that are supposed to help you and they don't believe you. also, what i realized that this crime is held to a really high standard. if i was murdered then okay, they will do something. if not because i am still here and it was a an aquain tans it's notenot taken seriously.

i told them that two other women were raped and drugs by this same person and the investigator didn't even interview them. the people that are supposed to help us and protect us don't do that. i was dropped by the d. a.'s office and there was another agency who dropped me, so basically i am here advocating for myself and that should not be the case. the mon ter who raped me is still out there and i wasn't the first person and i won't be the last he did this to. yeah, something needs to be done and this sharp office will be a place where victims like me can go to and complain about the departments who aren't doing anything to protect me or other folks that go through this, so i urge you to support this and get the sharp office going as soon

as possible. thank you. >> hi my name is megan way land, speaking on behalf an organization gabriela that campaigns on women's specific issues -- we have chapters here in san francisco and oakland an also across the u.s. and internationally. many our members are sisters, mothers, children have suffered from sexual assault. the inadequate response and subsequent disrespect of sexual assault survivors is a second as well as ongoing form of violence against women.

we see that our family members an friends are not only suffering immediate act of violence against them but also the subsequent institutional violence. for this reason we want san francisco to lead and we demand the immediate opening of the sharp office and demand that this does not wait any longer. you know we see movements across the country with the hashtag times up and me too where women are saying enough is enough and we have been doing that for decades and centuries, so i think san francisco has the chance to lead and be an example. >> i am in full support of the

immediate opening of this office and think it's important. indiscernible. this was an oversight of our city government and was very unfortunate the outcome of that, but it is our responsibility victims an survivors we are seeing here in this room victims and survivors are here fighting for themselves and it's about time, it's our moral responsibility to also fight for them and we see time and time again and you have heard in this room that young children are

also victims of this, and it's not just women and it's also young men so i really urge you to open this office immediately and it is our responsibility and i hope that the board of supervisors can really hear this out and i know that you all are in full support of it and hopefully this is something that will not get watered down and it is something that we in it's handling are able to hear out the victims and survivors and what they need in a vulnerable time. thank you so much. >> my name is makayla and i will read a statement on behalf of a friend of jane doe. when my job transferred me to san francisco three years ago jane doe was introduced to me by my best friend's husband. she quickly became my closest

friend in san francisco. i was drawn to her for so many reasons and admired her for her work and she would sharehi with anyway she helped facilitate in san francisco. he was a talented writer and one who dedicated her career to bringing fairness to those who lived in the city. she laughed a lot. there was a lightness that coil out in people when she was around. she enjoyed intricacies of life. if she wasn't training for a half marathon he woul she wouldn her bike or walking her dog. rewind to 898 ago to a phone call that would change all of it. jane doe called me that morning

after the rape weeping and reporting to me that something bad happened and in a state of complete shock i wish i could report that since that horrifying day things continued to get better, instead i have watched the progression of what it means to be a rape victim secondhand. i have witnessed depression, pervasive anxiety, pdsd, shaking of hand and voice and even though she has sought continuous treatment these symptoms persist. i feel angry that my closest friend was taken away from me. sorry is my time over? >> yeah. >> i support the opening of the sharp office. >> i speak today as an advocate

and seven year survivor. my experiences through people that i have met, my friend and my clients and delays and responses to survivors delay it is healings of our individuals and communities. these traumas are deep-seeded. of the hundreds of people that i have met, i have known less than five that come forward. it's important that when someone does report that we take it seriously and respected. there are many out there, queer, trance, people of color that are treated unfairly every single day. we need to report if we are ever going to make a difference.

>> any other member of the public that would like to speak in seeing none, public comment is closed. i would like to make a few comments and -- i know cheryl davis was here but i don't see her now. i want to thank from the bottom of my heart all of you that came out to speak today. sharing your experience and your trauma in such a public setting is scary and it's hard and quite frankly it's heroic, and i can't tell you how much i appreciate how much you have all educated me over the last few months starting with jane doe, who has

opened up my eyes to this horrific crime, it's prevalence, and the absolutely inadequate response that we have in the city of san francisco. the issue of sexual assault and harassment as we have all been walking with the me too movement and the times up movement it's an epidemic. one in two of us will be sexually assaulted. one in six men will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime. if there were any other crime of this magnitude and this frequency in our society, any other health epidemic like rape happening in this country, i am pretty sure that alarm bells going off that resources would

be poured into this issue and there would be protests in the streets until someone did something to address this crime, but because as we see here today it's mostly women who are victims of this crime and who are coming forward in heroic ways to tell our stories, we do not give it the attention and respect and the seriousness with which this time and this epidemic deseres, and to address something this large, i mean, one in two women in our lifetime. that means my 5-year-old daughter has a 50% chance of being sexually assaulted by the time she dies. wow, all four of us have daughters on this committee, and as a matter of fact supervisor yee has granddaughters. to sit with that statistic is so

step up and doing sometge haveo about it. sharp is just one small intervention in this hugeness of this crime. we need to do more and step up on prevention and educate our young men in schools all throughout san francisco and colleges all throughout this town about how this crime impacts us and what it would mean to treat one another with respect. we need education across the board for all of us to understand what consent is, to understand how to keep ourselves safe, to educate public officials like jane doe as educated me and now all of you have educated me about what you go through once you have been a victim of this crime and try to speak up and get help.

we need education everywhere. we need cutting-edge health care because when this crime occurs there is trauma to your body, there is trauma to your heart and trauma to your mind that takes years and years if not a lifetime to heal, and we do not have that level of health care in our city treating this crime like it should be treated. we need thorough investigation, so someone in a case like jane doe and tiffany tell us when they know they are not the first and they know they are not going to be the last, where they tell our police officers that they personally know of other women who have been raped and drugged in the same way and then get brushed off. no more. we need cutting-edge investigations. we need the best toxicology

reports and we need to immediately grab video camera and take these crimes seriously, so we stop further women from being victimized again and gain and where appropriate and where a victim wants to go forward with a prosecution, we need to treat that seryoursly and get the best investigators. we have heard time and time again that the vast majority of women raped do not come forward and don't file police reports and don't go to a hospital, why? because perhaps when they do they are treated so poorly what would be the point. there are issues like documentation status that terrorize women and women who have spoken today who are transgendered who do not feel safe in your criminal justice

system so we need to look at these issues that compound sexual assault and need to figure out how to allow women to feel safe to come forward in the first place and get medical treatment which they so richly need and deserve and then there are countless women who go to the second where the rape is their secondary medical issue and they are in such bad shape because they are living on our streets and they have a serious substance abuse addiction and they are not sexually assaulted just once but that is a regular part of their life living on the streets of san francisco. we need a safe place for survivors to go so they don't go back to the same street where they are sexually assaults again and again and again.

the sharp office is one intervention in a much larger intervention that needs to take place in the city and county of san francisco and all over the country. sharp is just one intervention but so critically important. it is because we have heard story after story after story after story over decades length of time that the same issues that plagued us a decade ago are plaguing us today and that police officers in the special victims unit who supposedly get special training are telling survivors because they had a drink an that was drugged and ty drank the drink that per

perpetrators to this violence. unless you had a knife to your throat and ha thought you were going to die is probably not enough to bring a case guard anforwardand it's not enough ev. stories where even at general hospital that rape is a part of life for women, which is true, one in two of women are raped in our lifetime. these are the stories that we heard over and over in a hearing we held a couple months ago, and what we heard today and what we have been hearing after talking to survivor after survivor aftersurvivor. we do not have the systems in place in the city of san francisco where we are taking this crime and the women

seriously who are coming forward and asking for them and sharp is going to change that. it is not a panna see yeah or a cure all. it is designed to fix our systems and designed to look at city departments and start change right here at home where we have power to set the example for the nation about how cities and city departments should be working together and treating rape. it is very important to me because over the last couple days whether i have heard from the mayor's office or the department on the status of women or police department or colleagues very confused about what sharp is. it is an office designed to get accountability and to change city systems internally in franco we are not anyl no longer doing wrong by women, but we are

setting the standard for the country about how we do right by women in al and all sexual assat survivors because it's not not only women but men too. i hope i have made that clear. towards that end i am going to make a few amendments to the legislation today that i want to bring forward. we have talked to all the city departments and we agreen agreea few amendments are warranted a. the first is on page 7, section f. it's introducing language to clarify our intent that the department of human resources continue to address personnel-related managers include sexual harassment claims from one city employee to another employee.

we never intend for sharp to takeover when there is a complaint in the city of fran, so we are putting language in to clarify that. number two, page 5 lines 1-4 and lines 11-13. >> supervisor safai: please slow down. >> supervisor fewer: this is specifically namin naming that e sexual assault response team also known as the sart be engaineengaged by the sharp offd dow is an important agency that works closely on this issue and

that the sharp office should be regularly collaborating with and in particularly working with the dosw to build upon previous recommendations of that office where appropriate. finally, please let me know if i am going too much, page 7 lines 3-6, i am requiring that all the staff members, we are asking again for three staff members in this office, that all of them be trained as sexual assault counselors to ensure that they have the necessary expertise to serve survivors while also helping to protect survivor's confidentiality. there was an issue brought up by dosw about whether a survivor brings a complaint to sharp whether their confidentiality

will be maintained and we have worked with the city attorney office to have the strongest language for that in this training. in any cases where any entity tries to breach confidentiality, the city attorney will fight to keep that as they always do and the survivor will have an option whether or not to bring a complaint if she wants to bring it for her or himself. with that i am happy to answer questions from my colleagues and whenever my colleagues deem appropriate wanting to bring up dr. m oranges rassi. >> supervisor safai: why don't we bring up