leading with our zero waste and leading with our zero waste commitment. so we worked with the mayor's office on a mayoral press release. we talked to curtis alexander from "the chronicle" and after he listened to debby and he listened to robbie haley and talked to us about our commitment, we wound up with i think a front-page story in "the chronicle" and that was our first kind of splash about the global climate summit and some of the policy commitments that the staff had put together. so we called that a success. so that was our first controlled, civilized splash. and the sequel to that was our action-packed, like blockbuster sequel, i should say. that was our press event at the mosconi center that i know some of you were at and i know that commissioner hoyos was there and commissioner ahn was there and commissioner bermejo was there as well. and at that press event, there were so many things announced that i have to read it off.

we recapped our zero waste commitment and we announced our initiative to decarbonize our buildings and to make them net zero buildings and we announced the green bonds commitment and the new solar ray going up at the mosconi center that provided a nice back drop for our commitments. and the mayor announced that she had agreed to be a 100% renewable energy mayor's co-chair for the sierra club 100% renewable ca campaign. that was also a success. we started small and then we just kind of grew big with that press event as well. so how did we do overall? again, we did well, we did well. i'm going to kind of -- you can see -- maybe i won't quite run through this list fully. but we were able to kind of track the stories that we generated ourselves. what's missing here is the stories that were generated just by the fact that the conference

was in the city. so there's too many of those to count. so that's another measure of success. and so i'll let you read the list but i want to point out a couple of the op-eds that the department, that peter, myself, debbie and a few other folks, had influence on. we were able to help facilitate an op-ed between the mayor of paris and our mayor. we had one from debbie, from "the san francisco examiner." as i was talking to the editorial page editor she decided if we're going to do this locally we need the state's perspective so that's how our governor of california's op-ed came about. and "the chronicle" did their own editorial as well. if you were on streets you were seeing our advertisements and watching tv, and the global climate summit was omnipresent and that's definitely our goal. and i believe that is my last slide. so i do want to thank debbie and

the commissioners for their support and i want to introduce my colleague luke, and i alluded to this and i'll touch upon it with a little more precision right now. when you can do all of this using the power of the press and then luke can take his advertising and outreach campaigns and bring what we're doing and the commitments to the people and then focus in on an advertisement and then it's on the tv news, that's when you achieve harmony between paid and earned media and maximize what you're trying to say. i think that we were able to achieve that harmony with the climate global summit and we have excellent partners in luke's team and wendy's team, so, thank you, and i'll introduce luke. >> so how do you go about welcoming the world to san francisco? when it comes to a global audience coming to the city of

san francisco to talk about sustainability and to talk about climate, where do we begin as a city and as san francisco and the department of the environment? to me it began with inspiration, we wanted to inspire others to learn, to share ideas and that was a foundation of the communications and outreaches that we developed for this particular -- well, for this summit. how did we go about doing that? and we shared ideas and one of the best ways to do that in advance of the conference or the summit, rather, was to develop a delegate kit. this would showcase all of the things that we as a city and a county are proud of. when i use the word "city" and county, 13 other agencies joined our meetings to discuss this conference or this summit, sorry. we had sftsa, and the m.t.a.

okay. we wanted to share the things that we were really proud of. this is one vehicle for us to be able to did that. that was something that was really important in advance of the conference. we wanted people to come here and to understand a glimpse, a taste, of sustainability coming to life in san francisco. in advance as i was mentioning before we wanted to put our best foot forward. so we joined d.p.w. with their "love our city" campaign. this is the saturday before we were out on the streets with thousands or hundreds of volunteers across the city and picking up litter and making our city, loving our city. and importantly when delegates got off the plane they were welcomed to s.f.o. with messaging and welcomed and there were light poles across the city. but we as a department wanted to take more of a personal touch.

so we spent time in advance of the summit creating partnerships with the hotels. and these are really important because we wanted to help them to share their sustainability and successes and highlights with these delegates when they came to each hotel. but beyond that we wanted to create partnerships because we wanted to do things that we were really proud of, like remove single-use water bottles from the rooms of delegates. and for the hotels that had the majority of delegates attending them we removed them and replaced them with reusable water bottles that are all in front of you. not just a welcome though, but a welcomer and a celebration and a recognition and appreciation. but this wasn't just about the delegates. this wasn't just about the summit. this was about bringing the community to the conversation which is why we hosted a school education poster contest for elementary school, middle school and high school students. and this is a great opportunity for them to share things that

they were really proud as it relates to the environment. in fact, there were 270 posters entered for both the middle school, high school and elementary as well. and when we talk about helping the city shine, we really wanted to coordinate our advertising efforts. we wanted to make sure that we are bringing our best foot forward in terms of 100% renewable energy and the commitments that we were making. which is why we created this campaign, 100% renewable energy. sorry... i will squat. 100% renewable energy. easier than finding a friend in delores park. and addressing 100% renewable energy and sharing things that people associate as barriers to participating in 100% renewables. and people think this is just for homeowners who would put solar panels on their roof. no, it's for renters, that it's easy to do, affordable to do.

it's cheaper than garlic fries on gameday and cheaper than tacos on tuesday. this is a light hearted way to connect our programs to 100% renewable energy and to build excitement around the city, around our sustainability initiatives. as you may know on the wednesday of g-cast it was an important meeting going on at c-40, at city hall. we took this moment to launch our refuse, reuse campaign. and what i really appreciate about this campaign is that they were asking a simple action from people. we want them to refuse single-use items like a coffee cup, cutlery, and also things like plastic bags and instead to bring their own reusable versions instead.

>> meantime, we had battery waste. i don't know if you seen it but it's loud. it's vibrant and it is exciting. this is a great way to capture people's attention and talk about something that they may

not have entered their minds. which is what should i do with batteries when i'm done with them? we also had our multi lingual campaign supporting homeowners in san francisco. with rebates to improve the energy efficiency and comfort of their home. i keep saying, in the meantime, at the same time, we were doing these things one more to that. while all of this was going on, we had 19 tours across san francisco with art, our partners at sfmta at the airport with a hard hat as well. beyond the tours, i want to turn it over to sean to share some of the events and some of the activities and those activations she led as well. >> hello. so i'm sean, the manager of the development and community partnerships for the department. so, i know all of us feel this

way -- our staff is so incredible. our commissioners are so incredible. i'm going to talk about some of the events we were involved in. it's just the tip of iceberg. all of our staff asked to be on panels, asked to participate ner to put together events. there was so much going on. we are the coolest people in town. thank you, very much. just a few of the things that we worked on. food. all-day event at the library around getting rid of up stream waste. food. huge, huge fabulous event on the last night of the g cast celebrating composting and local food with johanna macey and john whick as the speakers. forest, right. again, getting back to the press and the programming. we had an urban forest symposium with a tree planting and press conference. i don't know what newspaper that

person works for, the big, tall tree person. biodiversity. food, forest, forna. people didn't want to leave with all the of our partners. it was supposed to end at 5:00. peteing couldn't get them out until 6:00. they were starving but they still wanted to stay and chat. fairness. we had a huge event between u.s.f., m.l.k. foundation around ethics and climate justice. we were able to get dr. bob bollard to speak, which is a lot of us -- our personal hero, right. these are a lot of wonky stuff. i want to quote leonard bernstein. the thinkers that will save us that articulate, educate, defy, sing and shout the big dreams. the artists of the world can turn the not net into reality. and so, i was so excited.

i mean like 500 500 events. that is how you grab people. we can be charlie brown's teacher all daylong but you grab people through the arts. and so, even our san francisco symphony performing copeland's coal mine remove is huge. when our symphony is involved, it's all over. our symphony is involved. if you are not involved you are the only person who isn't involved in this. i think our symphony is probably the first symphony to say you know, we're going to take on this issue. so, that was totally exciting. our cultural centers, you know, we've got five around this city. the chinese cultural center was featuring seven artists with photography. our african american culture

center, day-long symposium with panels and performance, right. this is one of the photographers with the chinese cultural center. the climate music project. again, it's part of the beat batteries and the coffee pot. people go from one to the other and stop at the climate music project, which was going on all day on the steps of the library. they come out, perform around what you want the future to sound like. lots of rappers, spoken word, classical musicians, it was an amazing day. climate ballet. all about glaciers. the other thing about art that i want to say, you know, we have to have some joy in this work. a lot of times, we sing, we dance, that invites people to join us in this movement. this is from the climate march.

i just love this. this was a new orleans second line. i hear that and i am marching with you. a lot of other people are too. the last thing, you know, artists have been asked to turn this not yet into reality. the g cast was really about all of these delegates from around the world saying how are we going to turn this not yet into reality. i mean, i was so -- it was a peak experience for me. i hope it was for you as well. we're turning not yet into reality in the city of san francisco. and it's just so, so exciting. city hall, the standing march, right. fom-o o. i didn't get to see this. i was at the fabulous reception at our office, right. anyway, this is us. this is us turning not yet into reality.

questions? [applause] commissioners, any questions? thoughts or comments? >> it's not a question. it's just phenomenal. thank you for all the sweat and energy and creativity and intelligence you all poured into this. it's remarkable. it's great to see the images and if there's things we can do -- maybe this is a question. maybe it's for you, charles. what are your thoughts regarding the crscendo that's been created and how to continue to build? are there any opportunities for the rest of the year to touch on what was built and keep the spark alive? >> sure. i think there's a couple of opportunities starting with implementation of some of our

commitments. now that we concocted policies, we've weighed its pros and cons. we bought in from other city departments. the next step is implementation. we already know that there might be clean-up legislation that we will need. it will advance policy a little bit more. it's another press opportunity to highlight what the city is doing. we made bold commitments and there's will be implementation opportunities to talk about what we're doing here in the city. i know there were other commitments that they were makeing and we're still taking a look at those to see if we can adopt them locally. we got our hands and arms around all that we could and now that we've kind of digested that, we'll move on to other things. we took notice from other cities and counties. things that they were doing that maybe was completely new to us and we want to try. we'll need some more time.

we a looked at some of the best practices and we're going to be continuing to look at them over the next -- and so i think in the aftermath there's a lot of work that starts with what we learned and committed to. there's a lot to do still. >> let us know how we can help. >> sure. >> absolutely. >> commissioner stephansen. >> i want to echo the amazing work the department did. everything that i attended and everything i saw was intentional. and i definitely noticed the surround sound experience of the articles in the papers and the adds on the muni and it was a sign to walk with my new cup from the cup line onto the muni where i was like i matched all the adds as i walked down.

it was treat. i really want to give a special shout out to anthony. i felt like you did a wonderful job preparing us as a commission, for the work we needed to do that week and i appreciated that. my question s. was there anything unexpected that came out of it? was there anything that was sort of -- you guys were so well prepared. was there anything either positive that you hadn't considered or just that came out of left field? >> unexpected is maybe too strong. what made us so happy was to see the mayor talking about environment with such passion. when she gave a talk on zero waste. it was really our city's moment to shine because zero waste was not typically in climate conferences. this conference it is. she kicked off and opened up the session on it.

listening to her speak with such first-person confidence and certainty, was so inspirational. and watching her at the opening of the whole g cast welcome everyone to san francisco. so just seeing her get her stride on these issues is both -- i won't say unexpected but gratifying. and commissioner hoyos, about the future, what is on all of us now to make sure the mayor understands what is possible now. the world is watching and the world appreciates and it's a way for her to grab the reigns and run with them. >> is there other staff who had unexpected o experiences? >> a lot of us were hanging out saying it would be the same old.

people show up and they sign something, whatever. we've all done it before. and it really was a peak experience. it really was so exciting. for our staff and for other people, to have a feeling like this is different. this is different. it's moving. this is happening. that was unexpected. >> i just would like to add that i echo what debbie said about mayor breed. to have her on the world stage was really cool. i do have a question and another comment. the question of, all the wonderful press clippings or videos, we were able to look at those on the website so we can just bask in the glory of what happened? >> that will be in the next director's report. so, we'll compile some of those

that still exist. sometimes the tv and radio links come and go. we're still searching so we'll put those together and we can circulate them. we do want to memorialize them. >> the other thing is a lot of times you hear people say san francisco, the city that knows how. well, the department and our commissioner is the department ex commissioneand commission thw and gets it done. this is to show people what is possible. the welcoming. there was such a buzz in the city and everybody wanting to learn more. someone said, you know, we need to -- this is the way we're going to really make a difference by getting involved and not just sort of passing through and for getting about what happened. i think thank you for all your work. there's a lot of work to be done in the implementation so thank you. any other commissioners have

comments? >> one i really like to thank for reaching out to media. i've been hearing about this from radio to tv station to everyday articles about this it's really phenomenal. the second comment is it's great that -- which event i go to when i mention i'm commissioner the shine comes out on people's face and how proud or how really jealous about that we can work in san francisco. this is this department. i want to especially shout out to director. everybody is so inspired by your speech every time and every occasion so thank you. >> commissioner ahn. >> i'm very appreciative of staff for helping out with this event. it felt like every hour of our time was between five to 20 times the amount of time that we spend as commissioners. i was very appreciative of the

prepping, organization around the summit. great job. thank you. >> debbie, thank you for your outstanding leadership. i think that debbie should go to the u.n. she is the ultimate diplomat making people from -- not only across the united states but across the world who came to san francisco welcome the way she extends programs. really and truly brought the world to the commission office and department offices. thank you for all that. it was a beautiful event. kudos to everybody who worked on that. it was wonderful. >> the newest commissioner will chime in. i didn't get to make it to all the events. the one that really stands out in my mind was the reception at the department had. i came early and i stayed late.

it was an opportunity for me to talk to a lot of members of the department at every level that are doing so much great work. everyone was excited about that week. the thing that really stood out to me was the incredible moral and enthusiasm of this department. it real see stands out. it really impressed me. i think it's what motivates everybody to do all the great work we're doing. you all are very enthuse attic anenthusiasticand it shows. >> thank you, that's a great point. are there any other comments from commissioners? we'll take public comment on this item, please. >> hearing none, anthony will go to the next item. >> clerk: item # vote on whether to accept the policy committee recommendation to approve resolution file 2018-07-coe

adopting the 2018 reduced risk pesticide list for city properties. under the environment code, the department maintains a reduced risk pesticide list identifying those pesticides that may be used on city property subject to restrictions. the sponsor is debra rafael and the speaker is dr. chris agreeinger and they are resolution file number 2018-07-coe and the 2007 reduce pesticide list this item is for discussion and action. >> director. >> switching gears. you have an action item before you tonight. you are going to be hearing a presentation on our i.p.m. program. and i hope you will see what a thoughtful, collaborative, problem-solving, responsive and transparent effort this truly is on a city-wide basis. i also hope that you will hear that pesticides are a small part

of the program. in fact, they're very important when it comes to the commission, because it is the responsibility of the commission on the environment to provide the guide posts for their use. and so, each year, we come to you with evidence of our progress, with challenges that are before us and with our best assessment of the tools that are needed to maintain our parks and open spaces and our buildings as well. in the past couple of years, there's been much activity around a particular active ingredient glysophate. it was when the world health organization changed its designation of.

>> we went into high gear when that action was taken. automatically we changed the designation of glyphosate to a middle of the road risk pesticide to a tier 1, the highest risk. we amplify our restrictions of that product. even though other organizations were disagreein disagreeing witd health organization, it didn't matter. as soon as it came in we went into action. we convened meeting after meeting to ask the question is it necessary? are there alternatives? do we really need to keep this on a list. there were two court rulings and it's confusing about what the legal world is saying about the product. what is clear, there's tremendous angst and interest in figuring out what to do about glyphosate in commerce. i think all of this activity

under scores the tremendous importantance there is and having an institutionalized process. a process that is so robust that it can respond effectively and transparently to new information. this policy committee, the policy committee of this commission, takes this charge of establishing these boundaries seriously. and in fact, spent two entire meetings on this issue before this full commission meeting. so what you are going to hear tonight is an abbreviated version of those presentations. president bermejo felt it was important to present a full picture to the commission, because you will be voting tonight. but we're not going to go into the level of detail that the policy committee members heard. you are also going to hear from two key city departments.

it's important for you to understand what it means when a department says, pesticides are a last resort. what does that really mean? and how do they internalize that charge? you are going to see, in the presentation, that chris gives, a lot of images of people in training. they're going to be gathered around on the outside, they're going to be gathered around tables. basically the message there is that a huge part of the i.p.m. program takes place person-to person, professional to professional. people learning from the experts. learning from each other. solving problems so they can prevent the need for pesticides at all. so i hope after you hear the presentations, that you will come away with that holistic understanding of the rig or and substance of this program and understand what your charge is in your vote tonight. with that, i will turn it over

to chris to start us off. >> thank you, good evening. chris, department of environment toxic reduction and healthy eco program. so, may not match the scheer excitement of the global climate action summit. after 15 years, i continue to be excited about my program. i think it is -- it's not because of the pesticides. the reason is because we have, as debbie said, an amazing collaboration. a collab are tive spirit that's been very enduring for the past 20 years. i see it ever month. we have a problem-solving session in every meeting. it's very wonderful to participate in that. very proud of that. i'm going to lead you quickly through where we are now and where we are going with the program. in general terms.

that includes trends in pesticide use. then we'll hear from karla short, from public works, to report on some of their activities and their efforts to reduce use of the most hazardous herbicides on the list. and then, from lisa wayne. after that from department of recreation and parks. she likewise will tell you about some of the projects and activities they've been up to. just as a quick sampling. i'll come back and just outline what is before you in terms of changes in the reduced risk to pesticide list for this year. so, without going into the details of the ordinance requirements, there are a number of public transparency requirements written and one is tonight your review of the annual reduced risk pesticide list. the activities ha we have been up to since last year, first off, starting with trends. if you look at this graph, it's

from 2010 to the present. the red bars are tier 1 pesticides of all kinds. that is the highest hazard pesticide. tier 2 is green. this is the tier as they were when we were creating the list. you can notice that the direction -- it's going in the correct direction. what you don't see is that in 2015, when glyphosate was categorized as a problem able carcinogen, it became tier 1 in a lot of the yellow you see in previous years would be red now. the tier system really helps us to focus in on our priorities. on which products we have to pay the most attention to on finding alternatives. that is exactly what we did in this case. looking at the long-term trend, this is for all pesticides, not

just herbicides that are tier 1. from 2010 to 2017, it's a good trend. it's a 96% reduction. now, last year, in 2017, there was a small blip, which we also foresaw due to the wet year. it's still a 75% reduction since before we put in the restrictions to this year. it is in the right direction. if you put this in human terms, i guess, looking just at the parks within the city. in 2010, if you took all of the active ingredient for tier 1 herbicides, and you would have about 60 gallons of active ingredients. in 2017, that's 1.8 gallons. that's covering 3500 acres of

park properties under management. that's just the tier 1s. we've used tier 2 and 3 and we're actively finding substitutes for glyphosate ever chance we can. but this is good for perspective on where we are now. you know, the over all, i guess, picture here is that you go through that first 96% but that last 4% is tough. and there are certain stubborn weed problems, this is dubata grass and there are other examples that lisa wayne may talk about, where there are some situations there's no mechanical way to deal with it. these are people digging out a clump. if this was a cliff, it would be a worse problem. that last 4% is the challenge and it's what we're chipping

away at. the biggest way, i mean, one of the biggest activities we participate in are trainings around the city. i'm not going to go into the details tonight, but we did have property managers training for affordable housing. how to build pests out of your housing. spring i.p.m. trainings with three departments. effecting hundreds of gardeners and we do this ever year and we remind them of what the requirements are. that includes looking at manual and physical methods. it's worth noting rec park is now trying battery powered weed whips. this is a great way to prevent gardeners having exhaust spraying in their face every day. and the battery -- the new products are very promising. it's a good climate change move as well. decor bonnization of those. we have monthly meetings of the committee usually with speakers.

so these are some of the trainings that we are involved in. this is the way that we actually make the change happen on the ground. it's by having these champions in the department and all of these hundreds of people being trained constantly. we have also advanced our pesticides dashboard. if you haven't seen it yet, i urge you to check it out. it's much easier to update with the latest pesticide use data for city properties and it's interactive. so you can look at things in many different ways. that is my very quick summary of what we've been working on this year. moving into the coming year, we're going to continue our emphasis on the big picture of sustainable landscaping, not just the pesticide use but also everything else that goes with it. we still believe, as we have for many years, that bay friendly landscaping program is one of the best ways towards that end.

it is a certification of landscapes and landscapers. rec park and public works both have been organizing their own trainings of gardeners and landscapers. the policy committee heard from one of those in the august meeting. and the nice thing is, this is not just isolated issues that everything put together, it's water conservation. it's reduced waste, plant selection, pesticide reduction, it's biodiversity. we are going to continue working with affordable housing and there's a new phase in the rental assistance demonstration project in the public housing where we are going to continue our past efforts in building and designing pests out of these units in situations where it's really, really needed. we are also actively working right now. we have a draft of a new set of

pest prevention by design guidelines. this time, they're oriented towards landscapes. this is how to build weeds out of the landscape in the first place and rodents in every way possible. we have a workgroup. we meet every month. we're gradual leah arriving alye fundamental problems. that is my report. i'd like to car karla short, the the. >> i'm going to very briefly just highlight a few of the activities that we've been engage in that i think demonstrates our commitment to reducing our pesticide use.

over the past number of years, we've continued -- [ please stand by ] ... passed the exam, so they're now qualified. and this really has helped them i think understand and request less frequently support from our ipm program in the form of

herbicides and they are more engaged in looking for other solutions. we're trying to be creative in our approach. so the budget initiative in this year included a goat herd to help us maintain steep and difficult areas without the need of use of pesticides. we're not kewell actually going to have our own goats, even though i wanted to change careers and be a goat herder. we have goats on retainer. one of the achievements that is the least colorful or perhaps interesting, is probably the most substantive. our building design and construction division added an ipm specialtyification that will ensure that every building have

consideration. and we've been actively working with the department of the environment on the designing pests out of landscapes guidelines, which for me is, i think, so essential to helping reduce the need for our team to rely on herbicides and pesticides. additionally, we have a strategic initiative that will ensure that our specialist is consulted and able to weigh in on the designs early in the design process. not once it's too late to make changes. so we are requiring review by our team at 35, 65 and 95% of the design, which should also help ensure that the ipm considerations are looked at early on. and so i think the last graph shows clearly our commitment to the most minimal use of herbicides and pesticides. i want to give credit to nickie

who you've heard from in the past, our senior ipm specialist and has led the charge to achieve these really remarkable results given the additional work that we have and areas of maintenance we've inherited. thank you. >> thank you, carla. i'd like to ask lisa wayne from the department of recreation and parks to come up. >> well, while he's working on that, in the interest of time, i'll go ahead and get started. good evening, commissioners and director. my name is lisa, i have the ipm natural resources urban trails

and regulatory divisions under my purview. this is when we show you the slide of the graph of our reductions in our department of which we are very, very proud. thank you for that validation there. [laughter] let's try to see it. there we go. as i said, we're very proud, not to say we're done working, but very proud of this. so how have we as a department gotten to this point of reduction? well, of course, first and foremost is always our initial treatment for weeds. landscape issues is hand removal. we've had in 2016-17, 90,000

hours. we have the apprenticeship program, this is the first of its kind in the nation and we're very, very proud of those programs. and we've, as carla and chris have talked about, we've also had a very robust involvement in the bay friendly landscaping program. about 200 of our landscaping staff have been trained and that represents 75% overall of the landscape operations unit to date that participates in these trainings. we have annual trainings and the bay friendly and all the strategies are also rolled up into our strategic plan for our recreation and park department. we very much are committed to them. other ways that we have looked at reducing our overall

pesticide use in our tier 1 use is the alternative strategies, we have used goats in the past. on the left-hand side is a flamer, usage of flamer along pathways. and on the right-hand side are design alternatives. and carla alluded to this as well, being able to design in pest prevention from the get-go is helpful. this had been a field line that was -- just had weeds growing up through it, grasses climbing up the fence. it looked terrible. it was interfering with play. it was catching trash. everything else. and we went in and took out the lawn in that area and put in decomposed granite which has prevented the pest weeds from coming up through the fence. we've also used new ipm strategies in a wholistic way.

there are many, many of these examples, but i'm going to hone in on the lakes on the golden gate park. on the left-hand side is a piece of equipment that is removing the aquatic floating vegetation that chokes out the open-water areas. so it reduces water quality. it reduces the cultural value of the park -- of the ponds and the lake. it reduces the wildlife habitat and has esthetic impacts. we're able to remove 95% of the aquatic weeds in the lakes. that final 5%, because they're entwined in the surrounding vegetation or deeply rooted in the bottom of the lake, are very, very difficult. you see on the right-hand side, some of our staff following up in actually a pretty dangerous situation, walking out into that

mucky lake bottom with waders. you can easily get trapped. so we've followed up the final 5% by doing hand removal. on the left-hand side, you'll see what happens with all of that done, you do have some spots where that invasive aquatic weed will come back. and in this case, in the lakes, we've been able to completely remove all tier 1 use of herbicides and in limited situations, are use tier 2 or tier 3 or the spots we can't do with mechanical removal or hand removal follow-up. again, this is a good example of what we're doing in many places throughout the park system,

employing these ipm strategies. eliminating tier one use, eliminating roundup and the amount of tier 2 and tier 3 herbicides we're employing. as chris mentioned, there are still a few persistent pest problems that remain a challenge for us. we talked a lot in previous meetings about the affects on biodiversity in grasslands, but for those of you who haven't been along with us on the full ride. it's a plant that threatens the biological diversity. this is a picture from twin peaks. this plant community is host to an endangered butterfly that is found only here in the golden gate area of the world.

o al is not something you can control by hand. and it actually encourages the spread of the plant. tier 2 and 3 products are not effective on the plant. not only that, they can affect the surrounding vegetation. so we continue to use for this stubborn pest plant in order to preserve the biological diversity for the species and the heritage, we continue to use spot treatment of tier 1 herbicides in this case. so can see the blue dye on the right-hand side is an example of a spot treatment of plants in a grassland area. and finally, just one more example. the landscape. this is actually the park right out here by civic center,

jefferson. on the left-hand side -- let me go back here -- on the left-hand side, you'll see a mixture of grasses, the light green and the dark green. the dark green lumpy grass is agnomo grass. this is in the spirit of sustainable landscaping, we've been converting our grass, our grass areas to this grass because it's more sustainable. you don't have to mow it. it doesn't require much fertilizer. the mowing reduces our carbon footprint. it requires less water. it is the landscaping. on the left-hand side, the lime green plant is kikuyu grass. and on the right-hand side -- let me see if i can go back here -- you can see it grows

into artificial turf areas into pathways and actually destroys our other infrastructure, our hard scapes and our other assets. so on the left-hand side, you can see a mechanical removal of the kikuyu grass. and what we've had to do in this case, the only option is another tier 1 grass, so when that grass comes back into the area. so the first line of defense is hand removal or mechanical.

in those places where it's not effective, in the final 5%, we employ herbicides. in this case, we don't have an alternative we can use here that won't negatively affect the grass that is the sustainable landscape character skks. again, that's a brief view through the whole department. you know, we are working on this problem actively with our ipm unit. throughout our entire system, whether it's golf courses, natural resource areas, parks and squares, our rec centres, we're very, very committed as a department. we're very happy about the reduction, but we're going to continue to try to work toward this further elimination of those tier 1 uses and our reductions overall. thank you for your attention. and i'm here for questions.

thank you. >> president bermejo: thank you. sorry, this is not my version of windows. so. [laughter] ok. i'm going to load you through the changes we're proposing to the pesticide list. since last year's. and here we go. recommended changes. so as a reminder, the restrictions that the commission put in place last year were on

tier 1 herbicides and they're listed here. no use within 15 feet of designated paths. more specific on public notice, someone wandering through the park will know exactly where something is intended to be treated. if they happen to stumble upon that, which they probably won't. blue indicator dyes to show where treatments have taken place. prohibition on use when berries are present. no use for purely cosmetic purposes, which is a challenging one, because you have to define cosmetic purpose. no areas frequented by children. which we have not done for many years. contractor training to make sure there are no surprises when there is a landscape contractor employed to do renovation for example. and maybe one of the more difficult once, requiring direct supervision by a certified am --

amly cater when a tier 1 product is used. most of these were put in as a result of the commission request or the public comment. the ones that you see in red here were put in there at your request, or by the request of the public. so i just say that to show, we really are listening. we're listening to the public, listening to the commission and listening to the people who have the boots on the ground and know the situation. this year, we also actually in response to some public comment, we are proposing to expand some of these restrictions to all herbicides, so the ones listed here, that is the public notice, the indicator dyes, no use on edible berries when berries are present and the contractor training, we think it makes very good sense to expand those to all herbicides going into the

future. and we have discussed these with the working group, with other departments. we have a new prohibition on using herbicides on green roofs and green walls. this is a new thing for us. we've never gone here before. and it's a new thing for many people, for people who have these structures, trying to learn how to best manage these things. we want to -- because it is in such close proximity to people living and working, we feel that we should start with zero. and if there is some situation that comes up, we want to have a discussion about it and try to do some problem-solving. so it's prohibition. and then maybe a more subtle change is tightening up the format of the restrictions. previously they were formatted in the form of prohibitions and then allowed uses/exceptions. this caused confusion for some readers.

and for example, we require this very specific posting for a tier 1 herbicide in one part of the restrictions and another part of the restrictions from last year, it said that treating for invasive species, threatening biodiversity was exempted. so it becomes confusing for the user over the list. and of course was not our intention to make that an exemption, but we wanted to make this crystal clear for the people using it. and then for the actual products that are being added and removed from the product list. there are no big surprises here. we are adding two tier 1 products, but those are boric acid ant baits. the reason for that, ants change their appetite. we need lots of different

formulations available. it's all the same active ingredient and it becomes cumbersome to add every product on the list when we're trying to regulate the boric acid. and smoke bombs for rats. we're still waiting for the dry ice product which has been registered to be available here. and when that is available, we will not have to use smoke bombs for rat boroughs, but we still need something. you see a summary of the changes. i won't read through all of it. on your list, they're color coded green for added, red for removed, and yellow for any changes in language. and the changes in language are almost all -- product name changes, number changes, very minor sorts of things.

so that is my presentation. thank you very much for your attention on this. i really want to thank our partners from the other departments for all the amazing work they do. they're the ones that make this all happen. and here with us tonight to tell a story. >> thank you, chris, for the presentation presentation >> commissioner wan: thank you, chris. thank you, lisa, thank you, carla. aren't we supposed to have public comment first? i should go? ok. nobody likes pesticides or herbicides. nobody likes to use them, but to see they have been used or to know that they have been used, i personally would really love it if the cy