vulnerable but i believe that enforcement plays a very important role in changing the behavior of drivers. i say this as somebody who is actually been hit by a vehicle. also my husband was part of the traffic unit for nine years. and he was a solo motorcyclist and i can tell from his experience also that when he parks himself in an intersection that people tend to pay attention and tend to pay attention for a very long time afterwards even after he stops and parking himself at an intersection with a police motorcycle. i think that it's a vital resource in the police department and our traffic company and is tasked with traffic enforcement. and also with the increase in motor vehicle san francisco, meaning then who do not know our roads and streets who do not know our roads and streets very well it seems that we would need more enforcement as we have more

vehicles on the road in san francisco and our streets are much more congested. i have heard concerns from residents about the need for more high visible enforcement and it's as a proactive measure. what i want to know are the numbers to gauge the levels of enforcement on our streets. for example, how many citations are issued by the traffic company in comparison to stationed cars or sector cars and where they are being issued. and are these on high injury corridors and how does it measure up across police precincts? how important is the traffic company in overall traffic enforcement? and what is their role in how -- i think that you answered basically this last question -- what is their role and how do they compare with -- i mean, how do they collaborate with also our vision zero team that's working on the vision zero goals. so today we're joined by commander teresa ewins, who is

in charge of the s.f.p.d. traffic committee and she'll share information on how the traffic company is enforcing top collision factors. also known as focus on the five. so i think that you're going to run us through some staffing levels and levels of enforcement and numbers of citations and the traffic. >> and the citations that were added for the eastside as well. >> supervisor fewer: okay, thank you very much. commander. >> thank you again for having me. we'll first have the slides which i believe that all of you have a packet for that. okay, can we switch it over. okay. so the overview of the traffic

company, we commit to eliminating fatalities and reduce severe injuries. traffic collision investigation and zero participation and enforcement and dignitary escorts, event management and crime suppression. so we have many different things that we do as a unit. these are the overall numbers from 2017 from january to december. you will see that we try to maintain a 50% of the total citations being the focus on the five. and as you can also see as the traffic company has a large amount of citations compared to the district stations. obviously, because our focus is basically enforcement. >> supervisor fewer: sorry, what does focus on the five mean? >> it's the five collision factors that we have found that vision zero focuses on being the

main -- the main -- i wouldn't say culprit -- the main violation -- >> thank you, supervisor. >> supervisor fewer: for the people at home. >> so focus on the five are right-of-way and red lights and speeding and stop sign and yield while turning. and so as you can see, i mean, if you have any questions at any point stop me because there will be other slides and there's a lot of numbers as you can imagine. so then we go into comparison to 2014 to 2018. and the top numbers are total violations issued and you can see the difference between the traffic company and city-wide which is the 10 district stations. >> what is the difference with the upper column? >> the upper column is total citations and the lower one is

the focus on the five. those are the totals. so that's all 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018. i know that it's hard to take in that -- all of that data, but the comparison is really from one year to the next and we went down this year for various reasons in the totals of focus on the five, but we expect that to jump back up in the coming years. >> supervisor mandelman: and i'm sorry, sorry for jumping in, but the last is a half year, is that correct? >> yes. they're all january to june to do a comparison. >> supervisor mandelman: ah, gotcha. >> so why fewer this year as opposed to last? >> a reduction in staffing and we have switched over to

e-citations which the technology is not necessarily -- it wasn't where we thought that it would be when we started using it. we use it a lot more and it's on a handheld. so the connectivity was not necessarily great because the locations that we were. so you don't want to hold on to a driver because your phone is not functioning. and we're working with i.t. and they have definitely fixed the issues that we're having. and then water. so our officers go out in the rain and they continue doing their enforcement and the water and the phones were not necessarily functioning so we're fixing that. and then i.t. is working directly with us and our team. >> supervisor mandelman: are you saying in the absence of a working device, the good old ticket book didn't come out? >> no, they do. the thing is that we don't want to hold on to drivers for extended amount of time writing a citation, especially on the

e-citation and the requirements for reporting on the data, it takes a period of time up to 20 minutes. so if that fails then you'll be holding on to that driver for a long period of time. so that's why our numbers in warnings and you will see the amount of warnings this year alone is about 1,600. so we do a lot of warnings for education as well as we don't really want to stop drivers from -- i mean, it's a long period of time. it's too long to hold on to somebody. >> what happened between your bumper years of 2014-2015 as compared to the last couple years? >> the staffing. there's a lot of staffing retirements, injuries, a lot of serious injuries as you can imagine. this is a very dangerous job and we have serious injuries as we

well. >> supervisor mandelman: how many in the traffic unit? >> right now 39, but two are serious injuries. so they're not on the streets right now. >> supervisor fewer: there's also a slide, supervisor peskin, that shows throughout the years how the staffing has diminished. i also would like the numbers before 2014 and my husband retired in 2012 and it was my understanding that at one time there were over 100 -- about 140, frankly, that's a big sweep, of motorcyclists and we can see that it's diminished. i think that there's other factors that demand -- well, not demand but i guess utilize the traffic unit also that are not enforcement activities, but, rather, escorts. which are of dignitaries that take up also some of the time of the traffic unit. >> it takes up some of the time,

but i would say that the demands on the unit are also not about visibility and it's about crime suppression and being in areas where there's a the love shootings and -- a lot of shootings and a lot of violence that are occurring and so the dmgds are also about vision -- demands are also about visibility and like you said your husband was on a motorcycle at an intersection and they stop. so putting an officer on a motorcycle in an area with large crime is a deterrent and assisting other units in their efforts for investigations. so there's a lot of things that we do and it's not just dignitary escorts but a lot more demand if you want to look historically a lot pore demands on us than -- more demands on us than before. >> supervisor fewer: i think so. i want to say why this is so tied to vision zero is that police -- in my opinion -- that the deterrent factor isn't -- i mean, to change behavior i think

that the thing that police can do that has the most impact is actually to give someone a citation. quite frankly, of all of my girlfriends and myself too, i know that it changes behavior. you think twice. you really do. and not only that but everyone that passes by watching a person getgetting a citation has a reminder that a person is getting a ticket and they also look at their own speedometer and look at their own driving patterns. so it has this far reaching effect. this is why i called the hearing to see what is the status of our traffic department and are we staffed high enough to meet the new need for preventative goals for vision zero and focusing, of course, on the five, but also with all of the added traffic and vehicle traffic in san francisco and people that don't know our roads. basically this is kind of why

supervisor peskin, that i called this hearing to find out what is happening to these staffing levels. i think that we can all agree that the white helmets is what people are looking at for enforcement and you drive and you see a white helmet you actually slow down and pay attention because those are the people that get off the motorcycles and give tickets. i think it's so powerful is this image that now when i ride with my husband on a motorcycle and he wears a white helmet and we go on the road and the lanes split people move out of the way and we don't really understand why and then we figure out they think that he's a law enforcement officer. this is -- so why i'm concerned in my district and other high injury corridors is that even the presence of them actually makes drivers be more cautious, be more alert and to be more conscious of their own driving and their driving skills and what they're doing and attention to the pedestrians.

but also the speed limits. anyway, i'll let you get on with your report. >> supervisor peskin: i want to acknowledge that you guys have done a bang-up job. >> thank you, thank you. just to add on, you know, i have a couple more slides but actually i have a lot more slides but, you know, from what you said, you know, behavior is interesting in that times have changed. the statements that have been made to our officers are i'll just pay the ticket, give it to me and it's not changing the behavior. it's more of -- and so that's part of the vision zero that we really need to address that behavior and maybe, you know, not to -- i hate say enforce increased fines, but the fines to them do not matter because their behavior will continue. and i'll share some numbers with you later and some of the issues

in different parts of the city. >> supervisor fewer: thanks. >> so citations by race and ethnicity. you will see that -- so this is a current breakdown and there's other locations that the public can actually look to. d.p.a. just sent out a report and their report for their complaints is .33% of the allegations are race-based complaints out of 2,000 allegations. this doesn't mean that we -- we take that as being, you know, the bar that is set. what we say is that right now the department with the d.o.j. recommendations we're trying to really work towards understanding the data and when supervisor cohen put forward 96a in regards to the collection of data, that really started us on

that path of understanding that the need for the collection of the data and analyzing of the data -- >> supervisor peskin: excuse me, can you explain the bars, what about this... >> the sayizations and then -- the citations and the warnings that we give people. >> so the citations a are the r. >> off to the side which does not count into these numbers that you see to your right is the 1548 warnings that the traffic company put out. and we changed our data collection system from crossroads to e-citations and so with that it couldn't push that over to the e-citations. so we had our own data collection which we accounted for in this slide.

the department at this point is hiring academics to look over the information that's collected through the new state 8953 to really analyze the data and to see where we are, if there's bias, and really kind of taking a different look at it. because, obviously, the report from d.p.a. is great, but we also just want to be more thorough and get that answer and do better in the future. and just so you know that we're close -- the department is close to hiring an academic group to actually look at that. so this is a staffing for traffic company and you can see that in 2014 we had 46, and it went up to 49 and then progressively it went down in numbers and we're currently at 39. so in regards to staffing i

think that one of the things that are different, we used to -- and i'm sure that you can ask your husband -- to rely on the traffic company and say, traffic company, this is your role, go do that. and now it's stations. it's about stations and getting them to have traffic carts when they have enough staffing to do so and to hit the areas that we talk about. and we look at complaints from the public and our own officers' observations and complaints that you all receive and our discussions and we put that information out to the district stations and ask them to follow-up. because we can go out to a location but that does no good if we give out a million citations and it's not backed up daily by the district station. so we want to make sure that there's good communication with them and getting them to be on the same page as we are as far as enforcement and locations that are important. so this is our fleet. you will see that we have 85

operating motorcycles, 81 harley-davidsons and 4 kaw sidewalkies and -- kawasakis, and we have 2014 and 2016 models. and the remaining fleet are 2012 models or older. and in the budget we requested 10 additional harley-davidson motorcycles. and part of the -- part of our job besides the dignitary escorts is also first amendment right marches. our motorcyclists lead that march and we also take up the back to ensure that it is a good safe march, shutting down traffic so that people can actually go and march safely. and so with that the motorcycles heat up and we have to switch those motorcycles out and so it's important that we have additional motorcycles and we, of course, hope for additional

staffing. challenges... staffing shortages, emerging technology and mandates, strains on the unit resources due to staffing. staffing plan... i didn't change that number and it's supposed to be 39, i apologize. and two-year plans, the ideal staffing would be 84. and it used to be 100 which is ideal but as we -- as we hire and we have that hiring plan, i believe that we can get those numbers back up. >> supervisor fewer: how often are you putting classes through to train on the motorcycles? >> we have not had a class in a while. we just don't have the staffing for that. >> supervisor fewer: when is the last time that you had a class? how many people were in that class a few years ago? >> pardon me, could the speaker address us through the microphones up front for

everyone's benefit. >> sorry, so lieutenant martin and captain eswani are in charge of the traffic company. >> good morning, lieutenant luke martin, traffic company. so to address that question. the classes are generally two sergeants to 12 officers. because of the nature of the training that goes on for that class we can't really have more than that. >> supervisor fewer: i know, it's pretty expensive. >> yes, it's a two-month-long training course. >> supervisor fewer: my husband broke his leg on that eliminator. so we know. >> typically we get about a 80% graduation rate. >> supervisor fewer: so that in three years you haven't had a new class and you had mentioned that you had some very serious injuries that people are unable to resume on the motorcycles, is that correct? >> correct. so of the current 39 riding officers that we have, two are going to be out for undetermined

amount of time. >> that's where we get -- (indiscernible). >> supervisor fewer: right now you have 37 city-wide right now? okay. and are these deployed to the six stations? >> no, they're all assigned to the traffic unit. >> supervisor fewer: okay. >> they're split between day watch unit, and night watch. so it's broken down to maybe a couple -- toip so on any given day what is the average -- >> supervisor fewer: so on on any given day what is the number of the traffic officers on the street? >> we have about eight officers at any given time except for wednesdays we have an overlap day and we have the majority of the staff. >> supervisor fewer: really. okay. so how many dignitary escorts that you would say that you do in three months? >> well, that's significantly

reduced with president trump, he doesn't make it as often. but we get other dignitaries that come here that demand an escort. i would say in the course of the last six months we've had two. two high level dignitary escorts that have been rather hairy due to our staffing. >> supervisor fewer: so when you have a dignitary escort, it means those people are pulled from the traffic division, is that correct? >> correct. we pull all of our staffing to operate those. >> supervisor fewer: so you would say when there's a dignitary escort that on that day there's probably -- i mean, during that time -- and i know they can be lengthy because my husband has done many, many, many of them where he's waited around because they're eating dinner or they're in a show or whatever. and you have to be able to escort them. so it's many, many hours.

that would mean that the whole traffic company at some time may only have a couple officers on the street. if you only have eight a day on average, and you do a dignitary escort, doesn't it take more than eight officers sometimes to do the escort depending on how many cars the escort requires? i mean, so tell me how does -- i don't know -- to me it seems as though this is really drawing from a law enforcement on the street to do these escorts and leaving those days without possibly any police traffic enforcement from your unit on the streets of san francisco. is that a fair assessment? >> i would not say that. so i think that the idea that we

do the escorts and that's the only thing that we do -- if a collision occurs and keep in mind when we go to a collision it's usually very, very serious injury or fatality. if that occurs we do pull from the escort and we send people to that location to handle that. >> supervisor fewer: to handle the injury. but just to do patrol, you don't pull them to do that? they are on that escort, is that correct? >> they are. >> supervisor fewer: okay. so, clearly, when there's a police escort, when a dignitary escort is needed i think that it's fair to say and disagree if i'm wrong that that day there's probably for that period of time no one from the traffic company doing traffic enforcement on the streets of san francisco? >> no. >> supervisor fewer: okay. thanks. would you like -- do you have another slide? >> i do.

>> do you have a plan to have a class? >> we're working with the department to schedule a class. >> (indiscernible). >> i can wish. it's a wish. i'm hoping so. >> supervisor fewer: excuse me, about the class. so would your class be the same size, two sergeants and about 12 -- >> yes, yes. >> supervisor fewer: is that correct? okay. and about 80% pass rate? >> about 80%. >> supervisor fewer: now does anyone -- is it common mainly that officers leave the motorcycle unit after all of this training and do they retire or do some of them transition out to other units? >> so there's a p.1 which is a permanent assignment and a p2 where you have a five-year loan to the unit. and so once they're done with the five-year loan they go back to the station. >> supervisor fewer: but these officers are trained and they -- what would you estimate the cost of the training of the

motorcycle training that we've invested into these officers? >> i did not bring any of the costs related to training and i can get you that though. the idea was not to have a unit that's embedded with people for 30 years. because that produces some issues. and it was seen in the past as i am sure that you can talk to your husband about that. so that's why the rotation for the motorcycles as well as the honda unit, the dirt bikes, is very important and that's p2. so we do both p1 and p2. >> supervisor fewer: but i do think, commander, that this is a unit that actually is by senority, is that correct? >> no, not with the p2. >> supervisor fewer: but with the p 1s they are? >> yes. >> supervisor fewer: i think if we train them and they're fully trained on the motorcycles and they pass the training that it just seems as though we should keep them on the unit to

grow the unit versus training new ones that come in and transition now five years. especially because if you don't have a class, you haven't had a class in three years, it seems as though you might waive that p2 whatever policy to allow them to stay longer until you staff up even. because -- the p1s don't normally leave unless they retire? or are you seeing them transfer out to other units? >> i'm not seeing them transfer to other units unless they are promoted. if they get promoted they go to a different unit. >> supervisor fewer: thank you very much. >> this is a high energy corridor network. one of the things that was brought up was i believe that it was megan looking at the different signaling out the streets themselves. in our last discussion i found it interesting that we can provide that information to the district stations and really have them also focusing in on those locations as well as

traffic companies. so that's going to be happening in the future with further discussion from d.p.h. so traffic company enforcement and deployment. focus on the five high injury corridors with high fatalities and severe injuries and partnering with the city agencies like m.t.a. and d.p.h., and the unified school district and the c.h.p. to name a few. and operational enforcement of the locations identified with complaints. the board of supervisor stations and the traffic company observations of location when's they are actually doing enforcement. and then special events, we attend special events and coordinate, like sunday streets, facilitating first amendment events and community outreach events. so a couple of the grants that we do from m.t.a. which has been helpful i think, that the

traffic company organizes, safe routes to school program, 14 unified school district schools located on high injury corridors and so in 2017 we conducted 44 operations and cited 1580 individuals in regards to the school bus. 2018, operations was 30. and 602 citations. what we did with especially 2017 was included the district stations in that. we really wanted to teach the new people -- because there's a lot of new officers at our district stations now and teaching them the differences, you know, school buses need to be protected. kids are definitely out there on the streets. and these are also near senior centers. we're targeting -- we're following the buses and when that sign comes out if anyone passes we cite that person. so we got great positive

feedback from the bus drivers as well as kids and there's a great interaction with law enforcement and the kids going to school. distracted driving, which we all complained about. this is a newer program. in 2018, it's only july -- nine operations with 167 citations. we literally drive around, watch people in their vehicles and see them texting or looking at their map on their phone and we cite them for that. it's a good program. >> terrorism. >> supervisor fewer: is it all grant funded? >> yes. >> supervisor fewer: so if these are not -- if the grants went away or do you do additional officers in addition to what is grant funded on these particular items, programs? >> no, no, we don't. because we bring in additional officers on overtime to do these

programs. so we don't impact the stations as well as our staffing. so, again, pedestrian and bike enforcement operations. these are great operations. we put a decoy out there to cross street and if somebody doesn't allow them the right-of-way they get a citation and it's good for the station and it's good for the traffic officers. definitely the community when they're watching something like this operation it really definitely hits home for them. and so 2017, 52 operations. and 1367 citations. and 2018, 24 operations and 559. speed enforcement. this is the enforcement where you have a device and it engages speed. we didn't have the numbers for 2017, i apologize. but 2018 we had eight operations and 142 citations. a lot of -- we had a lot of

citations in the tenderloin high injury corridors and we try to focus on those corridors. >> how can you have an unknown number of citations in the previous year? >> we didn't have the data, we couldn't locate it for that operation. we're still trying to find it. and then, of course, we go into some of the pictureses that we took for our -- pictures that we took for our officers with special operations. >> many fewer operations this year than last? >> yes. it depends on the funding as well. but we do additionally, you know, we have -- when we talk about t.n.c.s, transportation network companies, the red lanes for the buses, we have an additional funding tool for that through m.t.a. where we go out and we find people in red lanes. or doing illegal turns on market

street. and we have over 1,600 citations, 1,000 plus are for t.n.c.s. so it goes back, again, to the business of t.n.c.s and the fact that getting citations does not bother them because they're just pick a site and pay it and then go back on the street and earn more money. so it's a different mindset. so we're trying to work with the companies and trying to educate them on the importance of really telling their drivers that they need to pay attention. >> supervisor fewer: isn't it after they have three moving violations that their license is suspended? >> yes. >> supervisor fewer: okay. so i just want to say that on average i just have to push back on those. everyone that i know, if they get a ticket it changes -- i mean, my girlfriends, my family members, everyone that i know

that gets a ticket and got one for not yielding to pedestrians yields to pedestrians every time. so these drivers might be just different than the rest of the people who are driving their kids to school and to work etc. so, i don't know, but it is just seems as they should be more conscious of it, they can't drive if they have their license suspended. >> i think that one of the things that we should start having our officers do is actually ask people if they live in san francisco or work in san francisco. when t.n.c.s come into the city are they really, you know, violating the law because they just don't know the city and they're making turns they shouldn't be making or do they just have a disregard for public safety? i don't know. maybe that's something that we need to look at. >> can i ask a couple more questions about this because i'm having a hard time believing that they don't care about the tickets because their wages are

so low. you know, there's been studies that after the cost of wear and tear on their car and the commute here and gas that they're earning oftentimes less than minimum wage and so getting $60 or $80 ticket and plus having to do traffic school to avoid the insurance increasing, it doesn't make sense to me that they wouldn't care about getting tickets. so i have heard this a couple times. but i'm just -- i don't buy it. >> supervisor fewer: aren't tickets more than $80? and aren't there tickets that are a hundred dollars, isn't that right? >> you have heard it and i have been told by my officers, is this something that they're just saying to just, you know, to tell the officer to go ahead and write it and you pulled me over, it could be, possibly. but is it something else? i'm not sure. not really sure.

>> what are the cost of the tickets, for example, for being in the red lane? >> i don't recall. do you know? >> (indiscernible). >> i'm look into that -- i'll look into that and let you know. >> so if it's incurring so infrequently that it's a cost that you spread out over your whole year rather than when you do it and the odds of it happening to you are pretty hi high. >> questions? >> i appreciate calling for this hearing and i have been campaigning for the last year and a half and the frustration from people about the feeling that traffic laws are violated left and right and don't get -- and that there isn't enforcement in this city. and, you know, compounded by the challenge of the t.n.c.s, in

fact, your numbers have gone down at the exact time when probably the number of violations happening in the city has probably been skyrocketing. so i think that, you know, this is a real problem. >> supervisor fewer: yeah, thank you, commander, for highlighting these numbers for us. i think that it really sheds a light on how many -- i'm always wondering why i don't see any in my neighborhood and now i know why. and i think that this is something that, you know, we can also speak to the chief about because i think that all of us would like to see more white helmets in our neighborhood. even driving down the streets and tell people to be alert. and i think that this is completely on line with what supervisor yee is saying about being proactive. but thank you very much. colleagues, any -- >> just to take public comments.

i note bob planthold to talk to us and if anyone else does, line up over there. >> i will go off on my experience. before the turn of the century we found in our advocacy that the traffic company was down to 80 and it was a great victory to get it up to 95. and before the turn of the century it was 109. so now this is an appallingly low number. and some years ago a previous chief took people from traffic company and put them in stations and saying you'll do traffic enforcement in the stations but they were taken off the motorcycles and put in patrol or sector cars. we don't know, you didn't ask, and you weren't told how many were out stationed and how many of those who are out stationed from traffic company stay at the station and after staying at the station were they still primarily doing traffic monitoring and enforcement? or are they doing general

patrol? that i think also works against good enforcement. and in addition, i think that what you need to realize with dig natori escort -- dig natori escort, it throws off whack when the prime minister of japan or the minister from turkey comes in. they fly into the airport. since it's state highways from the airport to the city, why not press chpay to do the escort into the city. and then our people can take over. the very fact that they're having to go 15 miles outside of the city and then 15 miles back, that works against it. i'm also going to say that there's been a rotation of people in traffic company to demand management. like the past five, six years there's been several people so it's hard to get to know who is heading what and know that they've got enough experience in

this area. study this in this area and it hadn't been the case as it was when i would say that a previous captain was there for a long time. so keep that in mind. thank you. >> supervisor mandelman: thank you. next speaker. >> hello again, supervisors, natasha with block san francisco. in the last iteration of the city's vision zero two-year strategy from 2017-2018 it was stated that they would establish baseline percentages for citations and warnings given to people of color. and we're happy to see the first part of this fiscal year's data today that we'd like the sfpd to continue to update this the day to provide -- this data to provide to the public to have an equitable process as possible. and the hiring situation is dire

but in the meantime state legislation like automated speed enforcement that supervisor yee was bringing up early, we'll continue to fight for the state-wide legislation to provide support for the sfpd in catching people speeding on our high injury corridors in our city. thank you. >> supervisor mandelman: thank you. any other members of the public who would like to comment? seeing none, i'm going to close public comment. commander, did you want to respond to anything? >> so in regards to the dignitary escorts, we don't go to the airport and they partner with us and they deal with their freeway. upon the escort entering san francisco we then take over at that point. and we also don't take them back to the airport. the c.h.p. does that. so the other question in regards to when the bikes at the station

level, they did come back to the traffic company and they didn't stay at the district station. once they decided to pull that program back. but when the program was there at the district stations, no matter what, it doesn't matter if you're on a motorcycle, dirt bike or tactical investigations, if there's a call for service that is a priority, you are to respond to that. so as far as, you know, our motorists drive around the city, their responsibility are to be police officers first and foremost. and secondly is the assignment of traffic enforcement. but i do understand the questions because it's changed. i mean, over the years it's changed dramatically. so hopefully through the hiring we'll be able to get to that point to build our numbers. >> supervisor mandelman: any further comments, colleagues? >> supervisor fewer: seeing none i make a motion to file this. >> clerk: that motion should

come from -- >> supervisor mandelman: a motion to file this from a member of the committee. >> so movedful. >> supervisor mandelman: we'll take that without objection. mr. clerk, do we have any further items? >> clerk: no further business. >> supervisor mandelman: seeing no further business we are adjourned.

>> the mayor of the city and county of san francisco. [applause] >> the hon. london breed: you know, as mayor, you go around, and you cut a lot of ribbons, and you do a lot of great

things, but i've got to tell you, nothing feels better than doing what we're doing here today, and that is protecting the homes and small businesses of so many families in the city and county of san francisco. 21 units of housing, 21 families, which includes seniors, which includes children, which includes a property that is not protected under rent control. this is absolutely incredible, and to be able to do this with partners like meta, and partners like the housing acceleration program, it makes all the difference because some of us might know that the city is bureaucratic, and bureaucracies sometimes move a little slow. and that's why having partners in the community to move these

projects forward as quickly as possible makes all the difference. to be able to keep six small businesses in business with affordable rent and 21 families in their home with rent protection is absolutely amazing and is what we do best as a city. [applause] >> the hon. london breed: and i am just glad to be here, and i am glad for eli and his family. he's going to be speaking and he's going to be one of the people who's going to be able to continue staying here. they were just telling me a story how they saw supervisor safai down the street, campaigning, and they asked for his help because they aren't under rent control, and they were concerned about losing his home, and here is a promise fulfilled because of the leadership of supervisor safai, and at this time, i would like to introduce the supervisor to say a few words.

[applause] >> supervisor safai: thank you, mayor breed. i'm just going to take a minute to thank the people that are really responsible for this happening. eli and his family, i met him at the safeway, and they talked about what we're all experiencing here in san francisco, which is a housing crisis. and this housing crisis is real. every day, we get calls, every day, we heard about families that are being forced from their long-time homes. so when we have an opportunity to work with community partners and to listen and to bring a policy and a program together that really works on behalf of stablizing our community, this is exactly what that means. so i got a call on a friday from caroline from meta. she says supervisor, you're not reading your e-mails. pick it up. and i said what's going on? and she said there's a real opportunity here. this is the first ever small site that we could do in your district. we have never done a small sites acquisition. one year ago, a little over a

year ago, i stood at a press conference in the richmond where we celebrated the 100th unit of the entire small sites program. today, this is -- this puts us over 200 units, which means in the last year, we've already doubled the program in one year. [applause] >> supervisor safai: so carolina and meta called me and said this is a big push. we're going to need a big push from the housing accelerator fund. we reached out to the community partners like poder and somcan that are funded to do the work that we're standing here today. they went in and met with the tenants. they lowered their anxiety. they said you're going to have an opportunity to stay in their home. and that's what they're funded to do. they're funded to build community and to really reach out and talk about the programs

that can stablize and keep the richness and diversity of this district, and that's what this is about. this is a 12-plus million purchase, the largest in the history of the small sites program. 21 residential and six commercial. it is the largest in the city's history, so i'm proud to have the support of this mayor. this mayor has made housing her number one priority and as someone that grew up in a community that was constantly under the threat of housing displacement and housing insecurity, you will have no greater champion in city hall than mayor london breed. so i'll send by saying any of the people that question why we fund community-based organizations, they're standing, and this is a true witness of that. the work that poder, that somcan and the work that meta

is doing and the housing affordability is doing is real and can affect lives. and i'm going to call up caroline from meta [applause] >> my name is caroline feng, and i work for the mission nonprofit agency. meta's purchase of 4830 mission street is a big day not only for us, but for the excelsior and the city of san francisco. 4830 mission street marks a huge first for affordable housing. today, we not just preserved affordable housing, we actually created affordable housing. let me explain. meta's purchase of 21 small sites in the last two years was largely rent controlled properties. in contrast. at 4830 mission street, we have a nonrent controlled property

that was built after 1979. the realtors blatantly marketed this as a rare opportunity, i quote, a rare opportunity to own a nonrent controlled property. let's take a minute to understand what that means. if a speculator had purchased 4830 mission street, they could have increased the rents by as much as they wanted. in fact, we saw that happen just a year ago when 400 london street, just two blocks away was purchased. when speculators bought that property, they forced small businesses to prematurely sign rents that would triple their rents, and the small businesses were at risk of being forced out. thankfully, the residents of 4830 mission street don't have to worry about that. [applause] >> with meta's purchase, this

narcotic rate -- nonmarket rate rent controlled building has been transformed into homes for 21 families and six small businesses. like the residents of 4830 mission street, the excelsior has a large population of filipino and latino families. most of them share perspectives that want to stay in this community. it's crucial that we buy buildings like this and it's crucial to keep families like them in the neighborhood. [applause] >> we need our city, our mayor and all of our supervisors to grow its innovative small sites program. this targeted approach has now been proven as the mayor and supervisor safai said as a major antidisplacement strategy strategy by taking homes off the private market. let me be clear, we need more

money to take buildings like this off the speculative market. we need mormoney in the san francisco housing accelerator fund which provided critical acquisition financing so we could buy the building as quickly as any other buyer off the market. we need more money in similar acquisition programs like meta's own program so we can compete aggressively, and we need more money for the mayor's office of community and housing development who as an ongoing partner has been willing to scale this program with us. meta could not make this on our own. i want to thank a number of folks. i want to thank the city officials for rallying around this work. many of you came to meta, asking how to implement the small sites program in your district. that includes supervisor safai. without advocating for this building and in your community, we would not have this district 11 building, so thank you. additionally, i want to thank

the building owners, mr. omahoni and mr. sullivan. owners are often forgotten piece of this equation. in this market, our owners could have easily chosen to sell to somebody else. they chose to sell to meta as a nonprofit to ensure that their tenants could stay in the city and keep their legacy in the city. [applause] >> and then, there are partner organizations, poder and somcan, who with the small but mighty meta team, sat with our tenants to explain what this program was and answer our tenants' countless concerns about their housing rights. our tenants can now stay here for generations to come. [applause] >> today is a day to celebrate, and let's all work together to make such celebrations the

norm, rather than the exception, in all neighborhoods experiencing displacement in san francisco. so i'd like to bring up eli who has been in this building for over 18 years. he has three generations in this building. he's what we mean when we say we are rooting families in san francisco. eli. [applause] >> good morning. today is a great day for me and my family because meta as acquired and converted this building to affordable housing through the city of san francisco small sites program. the small sites program is a project of the city. i believe the aim is to acquire buildings where long-term

tenants are vulnerable of being evicted. meta has worked closely with community organizations like poder and somcan to finally acquire this building, save this building and save its tenants. me and my clan of three generations have lived in this building for the past 18 years and will be able to continue doing that because of the small sites program. grateful to the leaders of our city, for meta, especially, and for the community advocates gathering together to make this thing happen. thank you very much.

[applause] >> the hon. london breed: and i just want to wrap it up by saying that when we talk about the need for housing in the city and county of san francisco. yes, we need to move forward aggressively and build as much housing as we possibly can, but we equally need to focus on housing preservation. that's what this is about, protecting people and making sure that they're able to stay in their homes, and i couldn't be prouder of so many people who made this possible. thank you to rebecca fror bein here from the housing accelerator fund, kate from the mayor's office of housing, thank you so much, the folks from meta. thank you for one of our planning commissioners who's here, myrna melgar, for all you do to continue to promote housing and housing production. i'm proud to be here that this is one of the largest housing purchases we've made as a city,

and i want to thank supervisor safai for being in tune of what's happening in thinks district and the needs of those who are here. thank you all for playing a part, and i'm just excited about this. and i just can't even believe that we have been able to do something so amazing in san francisco. and let's continue, as was said, to make this the norm and not the exception. thank you all so much for being here today. [applause]