>> commissioner veronese: the mayor recently announced that -- i can't recall the name of it, but the housing -- the apartments behind the houses, what is that called? >> the accessory dwelling units? >> commissioner veronese: the accessory dwelling units, that these fees are going to be eliminated to create more housing. have we done an analysis on that to see how that's going to impact our budget? >> that was submitted on friday. we're working very closely with the fire marshal and d.b.i. they've done an analysis on average scope of projects, number of projects anticipated, so we should know by the end of this week, actually an impact

to the department if we're impacted by it. >> commissioner veronese: and if there is an impact, i imagine we'll be asking for it from the city. >> yes. that would be part of our discussion with the mayor's office. >> commissioner veronese: because that would be a reduction in the amount of fees that we're receiving, and there's another reduction right there. >> absolutely. >> commissioner veronese: okay. thank you, mr. corso. i appreciate your information and input on the report. i'm hoping that the more we talk about it and the more we say it, it becomes more prevalent in the discussions amongst the members of the board of supervisors, the mayor's office, and the impact the issue of homelessness is having on not just our department but on all departments. >> thank you. >> president nakajo: thank you very much, commissioner alioto veronese. commission vice president covington? >> commissioner covington: thank you, mr. president. thank you very much, and thank you, commissioner veronese for, you know, going through a lot

of the questions that i was going to pose. so no, nothing to be sorry about. so the 4% to 5% increase in fees next fiscal year. >> correct. >> commissioner covington: that will begin july 1? >> it would usually begin september 1 given that the fact that the budget isn't actually approved, and there is a 30-day wait for any fees to go into effect after the budget is approved. fees would be effective 30-days after that. >> commissioner covington: okay. so on the one hand, we're increasing fees, and on the other hand, we're eliminating fees. >> i would say the department is not eliminating. >> commissioner covington: no, well -- [laughter]. >> commissioner covington: the department won't be collecting those fees.

>> correct. >> commissioner covington: so that's -- that's a bit troubling because it's not going to be an equivalent with the accessory dwelling fees being eliminated and 4 to 5% increase in all of the other fees. we're going to be in the hole. >> obviously, nothing has been finalized with the mayor's office. i'm just speaking to a.d.u.s, and the chief can speak to it more, we have people reviewing those, so if we're removing those fees, we are still liable for providing those services and personnel, and that is something we absolutely will be discussing with the mayor's office on.

>> commissioner covington: and thank you for that information, mr. core so, and pointing out that the fire marshal is always present at these meetings. for the fire marshal through the president, could you come to the microphone? thank you. >> yes, good morning, commissioners. andy coscio, fire marshal. >> commissioner covington: mr. fire marshal, could you give us some information on this dichotomy that we're being faced with? >> this has just been released, this concept, a week ago. so we are working with building department. building department takes -- collects the fees for us. they are the -- they handle the intake, so i've been speaking with their department director, what kind of numbers they're

looking at. i do know this, we process about 1,000 permits a month. if we're looking at just a.d.u.s, it's a small percentage. it's probably 50 or 60 a month. what those numbers look like, i don't know, but i can get those for you. >> commissioner covington: well, i expect it's 50 or 60 a month because there's a fee attached. once the fee is eliminated, more people will probably consider it. at this point, we can't say if it will increase by 10% or double or triple. there's no way of knowing. we just know that we won't be getting that money. >> i know. i'm not downplaying the impact. it's not significant, but it's not going to overwhelm us, either. i'd just like to know what those numbers look like, and i will know that in a couple of

days. >> commissioner covington: well, it's good to know that you don't think it'll overwhelm us. just for the broader discussion, the accessory dwelling units are both outside of the preent hoinciple home o residence and also within that same structure, people converting their garages and that sort of thing? >> correct. the concept for the a.d.u.s is you have to work within the envelope of the building. the most often, the most common approach is converting the ground floor garage units into a.d.u. units. >> commissioner covington: okay. great. and i know you have said in the past that actually the a.d.u.s add to -- because of the code, they add to the safety of the building ultimately. >> quite often, because we're working with -- dealing with a lot of existing nonforming buildings, meaning they met

code back in the day, but they don't meet code with the current building code. some of the a.d.u.s do make the building safer. >> commissioner covington: okay. well i think we're up to speed on that. mr. corso, thank you for your comprehensive report on the budget. this going back to the 4 to 5% increase, can you tell me, what is the rate of inflation currently? >> i don't know. i believe, off the top of my head, it was 3%, little over 3? >> commissioner covington: okay. that's something i was trying to figure out, because that's something we also have to factor in, what the current rate of inflation is. this is kind of confusing to me, that we're in boom times in this city. you know, there's so many cranes, there's so much activity, there's so much, you

know, creation of tech jobs and all of that, but yet, and still, we're being asked to reduce the budget. so can you give us a global perspective on why this is happening because average day people like me are saying why is the city doing so well and not doing so well. >> absolutely. the cliff note's version of that is the city -- i'm happy to provide any documentation on that. as part of their recently released i guess december five-year financial plan, they took a look at that in years going out. basically, all expenditures need to be backed up by money coming in, the concern is that revenue that is coming in that funds or expenses is growing at a much lower rate than the expenses that the city has committed to. so even though the economy may

be growing, it's growing at a much slower rate than the cost of salary and retirement benefits and health benefits for employees. and since a lot of the city's expenditures are related to personnel costs, that increase is outpacing the increase in additional revenue so there is abissue over time that there's -- an issue over time that there's an imbalance in that. >> commissioner covington: okay. we are slowly digging a hole that will get deeper and we may not be able to get out of it in ten years or so. >> absolutely. so there's structural city issues that need to be addressed beyond any fire department or city department, actually. and i believe that the -- i want to say if all city departments submitted their target reduction request, that's something like $40 million in savings, so that doesn't address that huge gap, so there's city issues that need to be addressed. at the end of the day, to your

point, revenues are anticipated for the city, it's just that expenses are outpacing that growth on the other side. >> commissioner covington: okay. it sounds like the national deficit. eventually, you have to pay the piper. >> fortunately, we're not printing money in the basement of this building. >> commissioner covington: we're not? when do we stop? how many people are there on the budget committee? >> 15, i want to say. >> commissioner covington: 15. and are pretty much all ranks represented? >> all ranks, disciplines. we have a lot of different ranks of specialty, which is good, but also everybody's advocating for their specific subject area, which leads to great discussions that we've had. >> commissioner covington: good. then the priorities of the budget committee, you said number one was e.m.s. staffing and number two was the incident support specialists. and then, also, what would

number three be? >> so three in discussions has been equipment. >> commissioner covington: equipment. okay. >> front lines, engines, trucks, things used every day, and then hose tenders. other additional equipments, radios, that would be used in an emergency. so there's an equipment request in the back of your packet. i failed to highlight it. i apologize for that -- in the back of your packet in the budget book, there is a departmental -- at the last page, there is an equipment request. part of it is fleet, but part of it is additional equipment items. the fleet is requested based on the parameters set forth in the prior department resolutions. so we still honor that on an annual basis, on an outstanding sneed, what has -- need, what has been allocated, and what we still need, and that forms the budget request. we're working with the mayor's

office on expanding that, but in addition, there's a number of pieces of equipment, i mentioned hose tenders, radios, brass equipment, p.w.s. equipment -- >> commissioner covington: so all of that is coptured on page 1 -- captured on page 104? >> correct. >> commissioner covington: okay. i will review this again, then. >> back to your question about priorities, just the day-to-day equipment, but also having sufficient resources in the event of a disaster. obviously, that's all tied together. the more engines and equipment you have in a disaster, the more dependable they are when you call in additional personnel, so that's been identifies as a prior. >> commissioner covington: now moving onto the number of recruit classes coming up, if it's going to be one a year where it's been approximately two a year for the last five years now, have there been any

discussions about making our facilities and our training staff available for other departments to train? >> so i think we can have those discussions now that that calendar has been cleared. there's still a large number of inservice training, and the work they do out at treasure island is incredible with the number of personnel that they have now. i'll defer to chief sato on that. i think we'll look at that while there's a gap between academies now as far as usefulness for the facility of having additional classes come in and making use of it considering considering all right. because at some point, i would really want to see a plan of action for having other departments use or facilities when they're not in need by the department. that was one of the reasons that i thought we went through the grueling accreditation

process so we should make use of that. >> absolutely. and just talking to chief sato the other day, they are going through the reaccreditation of that for the next five years, and everything seems to be going well, also. >> commissioner covington: very well. i will ask, when the time comes, that that be put on a future agenda. okay. thank you very much, commissioner covington. commissioner hardeman? >> commissioner hardeman: thank you very much. commissioner covington brought up that 105-page document. it contains revenues, expenses, detailed line items. it's quite a wonderful document, and sort of if you like numbers, it sort of leaves

you without many questions, so it was a very good job. this is only a draft, but it sure helps for us to understand. going to page 104, which i was going to bring up also, about the $58 million of apparatus, it's interesting on the cover page of the budget, that we have -- we have one paragraph that says in november 2005, san francisco voters passed proposition f, which requires the city to maintain and operate neighborhood fire houses and emergency apparatus at the same location and to the same extent as existing on january 1, 2004. so i'm just going to make a little point here, and you won't have the answer, but what was the condition of the engines and the aerial trucks

and etc. at that time? i would assume that would mean maintaining the equipment? so that's been a gray area. we're catching up a little now, so though these items are quite costly just for the vehicles with the trucks, ambulance, and the $36 million -- >> absolutely. >> commissioner hardeman: we do have a mandate by the citizens of this town, of the city, to have the equipment be functionable. and over the last couple of years, a lot of complaints from stations, and if you go out to a fire, whatever, people complaint. i'd bring up it's not just a request we're making, we're mandated by the public to make those requests and make sure our equipment is up to standards.

we have succeeded in that over the last couple of years, but i think we need to keep that in our minds as we're arguing for page 104. >> absolutely. i think the interpretation has always been that those apparatus would be in service at those locations. given the work of the bureau of equipment and the board, we've been successful in that. over the past few years, we've been able to increase the health of our fleet. we just took receipt of additional units. we have some additional units that will be on order in the next few months. there's currently legislation going through the board to expand the spending authorization on the city's engine contract, which is great. we're actually funded to actually exceed that limit, so definitely in the past few years, there's been some movement on it, but to your point, for years, there wasn't, and we're trying to catch up and do as -- get a heathy a

fleet as we can, and we will continue to do so and advocate -- not only to catch up, but to maintain that going forward. >> commissioner hardeman: so it would be that we're probably not in compliance. if we had a mutual person, arbitrator to go around and look at all the stations and listen to ul atall the operato that equipment. it would seem to me we're catching up, but we're not at a point where we should be by what the voters mandated us to do -- in my opinion, yeah. >> we're definitely not at the levels for which the commission has put in resolution to set standards for the department. we are definitely catching up to that with regards to front line service time, relief time, retirement time, and overall health of that. we are striving to that. i think there's a little bit of

gray area in prop f and what does it say about the health of the vehicles itself, but i guess as to what the mandates and the national standards are, we're still working to get there, for sure. >> commissioner hardeman: i don't know if this would be yours, but commissioner veronese brought up this the other day. the doctor, is he sitting there? >> he left. >> commissioner hardeman: any way, about the annual physical, are the -- are firefighters asked to take an annual physical -- physical or encouraged to take an annual physical? does anybody know that? >> so we have health check available. it's not mandatory or required. i think we had some discussions with the union on making that a few years ago. it was available for anybody who wants to. obviously, we would encourage

anybody to make use of that or through their primary health insurance, but it's not a requirement at this time of the department. >> commissioner hardeman: so when i was head of the unions, and chief, i had an interesting job because that was the way the unions work. we discovered it was foreseen -- members to take physicals, obviously, we couldn't force them, but we tried to provide some benefits to go. we figured it saved us money. but the reason i bring this up is if there was a -- not a mandatory system, but more of an encouragement to take a physical, the test to include cancer or any other -- bladder, whatever type of problem -- lungs, tests that would include

that would be something that i think we -- we're leaning towards in just a tashl discussion th discussion -- casual discussion that would be very, very prudent at this time. we have sources with their handout to check firefighters who come back from wildfires. i think that might -- we're talking about funding, so when we're thinking about that, that might be something that they should take as part of an annual physical as part of this profession. and it's -- it's something i think -- we're not in negotiations here to discuss it, but just thinking out loud as we're surprised as commissioners when we did learn that we don't have any testing going on for firefighters, and

now we find out that there's no sort of encouragement or force, but it might come to that where we need firefighters to take an annual physical to keep up on all these problems that the women's group just presented to us earlier. i'm not an expert on mammograms or anything, but make it a requirement for firefighters, not just san francisco. i'm just thinking out loud, and i'm sure the other commissioners would say the same thing, that we're learning what we have available for our firefighters, and now we're learning that it's not what we as commissioners would want to see. we'd like to see it -- to have more of testing, not just when

they come back from wildfires, but generally all the subject matters that have been going on. i personally don't think that we should have to have our handout with organizations that are member organizations that are having testing being done because people are fighting fires. i think that should be an obligation of this fire department and it should be an obligation of this city to make sure that any of those tests that have to be done do not have to be done in the current fashion. that is just my opinion as a commissioner. i have no authority to ask the chief to negotiate that or anyone, but that's my personal opinion, and i feel very strongly about that personally. >> yeah, to your opinion, obviously, we can't mandate people to do that, but we would encourage people to do that. i think we've partnered and worked with the cancer foundation for bladder cancer

tests and previous things of that nature, but we can absolutely have an internal discussion about that, what that would look like, and negotiate for that. >> commissioner hayes-white: and if i could add, commissioner hardeman, totally agree with your statement. as far as negotiations, it is something we looked at with local 798. we had millions of dollars set aside for something like that. we will always advocate through, as mr. corso said, an annual physical through their own private insurance, or we have an annual program -- money set aside, for members to go through this comprehensive testing. but we have run into some resistance on certain elements of whether or not the

information related to the test results gets relayed to our department physician. >> president nakajo: thank you very much, chief hayes-white, thank you very much, commissioner hardeman. again, colleagues, thank you very much for your comprehensive report, director corso as well as all the questions and answers, being able to given sight as well as actual information. colleagues, we have an action item in front of us. again, comprehension was a motion to approve. we are not accepting the target reductions. we have priorities of e.m.s. six, the retention of incident specialists and equipment, as well. commissioners, i would be open to a motion at this particular time. >> commissioner covington: so moved to adopt. >> president nakajo: all right. we have a motion to adopt from

vice president covington. we have it seconded by commissioner cleaveland. i'll call for the question at this time. all in favor, aye, all opposed, none. thank you, mr. corso. >> clerk: item seven, chief of department's report. report from chief of department. report on current issues, activities, and events within the department since the fire commission meeting on january 23, 2019, including budget, academies, special events, communications and out reach to other government agencies and the public, and report on overall field operations, including greater alarm fires, emergency medical services, bureau of fire prevention and investigation, and airport division. >> president nakajo: thank you. at this point, i'm going to entertain public comment on the chief's report. included in this report is a report from operation, but i would entertain public comment from the chief's report, and

then there would be a process after the chief's report for any comments or questions from the commissioners, i.e., the same for the operation report, as well. as point of information to you, colleagues, madam secretary, to the chief, unfortunately, i have a hard appointment at ten minutes to 12:00 that i need to attend at 12:15, so i will move this facilitation chair to our vice president francee cough g covington, when it becomes necessary to leave myself. >> commissioner hayes-white: with regards to us being midway through this fiscal year, we are on track currently. with regards to academies, our 125th class is in their third week. there were two members released during the e.m.s. portion,

which is the first two weeks of the academy due to performance, and this week started 12 more members from station 49, so we have currently 52 members in the academy. the division of training working in conjunction with the e.m.s. per diem has begun training eight e.m.t.s. and then, in addition, we will be doing some planning on start dates for the h-3 level one e.m.t. academy, which we're anticipating to be just after the beginning of the fiscal year in july, and the 126th academy comprised of 54 members to begin in the fall, hopefully, the september time frame. i'd like to acknowledge deputy chief joel sotto for the work they do all session

particularly when there's an academy in session. just rolling through and being mindful of the time, rolling through since january 23, on the 24th, i attended an hsoc meeting. it's the healthy streets committee with other agencies. i the 25th, i attended a celebration of life for a memory bear that we had acknowledged back in 2016, retired batallion chief al waite, who was about three months short of his 100th birthday, and the family had a celebration of life that we participated in. as i mentioned, the 125th class started on january 28, where deputy chief nicholson and i as well as the training division welcomed the 42 members of the class on that day. that day, i also attended a chinese hospital board of trusty installation ceremony,

and chief cochran in the back coordinated and participated in a civil support team drill. there was a simulated terrorist attack on alcatraz with biological weapons and chemicals. i'd like to acknowledge the -- lieutenant john baxter for putting together and his team a volunteer appreciation event. i know president nakajo you were there on january 30. we had very well attended. some of the members in this audience attended that. to thank the members that volunteered to assist at community events, trainings, and so forth, so that was, i know, something that we had wanted to put together for a while, and lieutenant baxter was sort of the impetus for that. mayor breed gave her state of the city address on january 30. i attended and i know vice

president covington was there, as well. on the 31, as you know, well awaited opening, reopening of station 16, brand-new station. thank you, commissioners, for being there, and thanks also to all the members of the command staff in particular or division of support services, chief tone tone -- tony rivera. if you haven't been there, i'd edge coura encourage you to take a tour. it's very nice, and so far, the members seem to be happy with that. on february 1, it was a veteran's leadership symposium. it was very well attended at the marine's memorial. i was asked to give opening remarks, and i'd like to thank the members of the veteran's group for putting that on. black history month celebration

was also on february 1, and i see attended that, and vice president covington, i saw they are there, as well. i also had a chance to reconnect with our former medical director, marshall isaacs, who's now the director for dallas fire rescue. we talked a lot about some of the challenges that 911 first responders face, including stress issues and so forth. he's written a chapter in a book -- actually, i'd given a copy of it to commissioner alioto remembeveronese. he left here in 2006. president nakajo was the only one that had the opportunity to work with dr. isaacs. as mr. corso stated on february 5, there was an sffd budget

meeting. i was scheduled to attend another meeting with assistant deputy chief rivera, but we did have the major incident at geary, a three alarm fire. commissioner veronese was there. the incident commander was r rex hale, and we had our hands full, but crew did a great job. like to acknowledge all the crews that responded to that fire as well as many members of the command staff, including chief cochran, chief sotto, chief rivera, and chief zanoff. later that evening, after i cleaned up a bit, that was a n.e.n. ceremony.

it's a community recognition ceremony. nert lifetime achievement went to miss joanie vanrhine. she's a volunteer out in the m mira loma park area, and so we copresented her award that evening. there was at hsoc meeting on february 7 that i attended. on february 8, chief dicoscio and i attended a meeting where the mayor introduced her new housing delivery, juddson true. on saturday -- this last saturday, i attended a lunar new year's celebration at the request of president yee in the ingleside district. yesterday was a very busy day. there was a chamber of commerce

breakfast that i attended. there was a rotary club emergency services day, where three members of our department and paramedics were recognized. paramedic edward byrd for his incredible community work that you did, and stanley macatee and seamus o'donnell responded to one of the most complicated extraction event that i've ever been to. we called them out for their excellent service that evening, and so that was very well attended. they also acknowledged, the rotary club, as they do every year, it was the 33rd annual police -- in addition to fire, police, sheriff's, and the u.s. coast guard. and then yesterday afternoon, assistant deputy chief cochran and i sat on an extreme weather

call, and there was an extreme weather call this morning that chief cochran sat on, as well as there was an after action meeting related to the geary and parker incident. on an upcoming, looking forward into the month, all of you are invited, and we can provide detail -- i think we have already -- to the chinese new year parade, which is going to be this coming -- or in a couple saturdays, february 23, in the evening, in conjunction with our asian firefighters association. that concludes my remarks at this time. >> president nakajo: thank you very much, chief hayes-white. at this particular time, are there any comments or questions from the commissioners? commissioner cleaveland? >> commissioner cleaveland: thank you, mr. president. just one quick comment. the chief mentioned going to the chamber of commerce

breakfast the other day. she didn't mention she was given an award for her outstanding service to the community for the past 15 years. the chamber represents the community, but i dare say the chief has been the representative to all of the people of our city and has been a terrific chief in that regard. her service to the community was recognized by the businesses and all the businesses recognized in the chamber of commerce, which is over 1,000, so congratulations, chief, on being recognized by the chamber of commerce for your 15 years of service. >> commissioner hayes-white: thank you. >> president nakajo: thank you very much, commissioner cleaveland. >> commissioner cleaveland: thank you. >> president nakajo: at this point, i do not see any other commissioners. i will call up the chief of operation, chief gonzalez. please proceed with your report. before that, i'm going to ask for public comment on the operation report. seeing none, chief gonzalez, please proceed. >> good morning, commissioners, chief, commissioners.

deputy chief mark gonzales. operations report for the month of february. there was one greater alarm this month. the second alarm cross of lessing, two story, type five. it was at 12:18, 18 minutes after midnight on friday, january 18. engine 33 was the first on-scene. they saw heavy black ♪ ♪ from miles away. 33 reported multiple rescues were being performed. a resident was at the front window of the second floor and was rescued by the driver of engine 33 using the extension ladder. firefighters found another resident by the trades man's entrance and performed c.p.r. engine 15 was ordered by batallion line to lead the line into the interior. and this was a hoarding

situation. it was not easy to get into the location. a camper was found in the garage, an r.v., which made access difficult. rescue two ased in rescuing another victim that was on the ground floor. due to the numerous rescues, and crews busy with same, a second alarm was called within eight minutes of the first engine company arriving. there was left turn wires arcing -- also wiring arcing above. crews encountered numerous obstacles due to hoarding. crews from bravo company prevented fire from entering other structures. six residents ex-tremendous indicated themselves in the back -- extricated themselves in the back yard. onto other incidents, on

january 1, first alarm, 1100 connecticut, this was the projects that are being razde on potrero hill, and they're boarded up, but people are finding their way in there. there were two rescued on this, as well. working with police on that, they're breaking into one unit, and making holes into other units, selling drugs in there, and some of these are booby trapped. there was a bay rescue or serve rescue on january 14. serve conditions were hazardous. surf swimmer christian jeffreys from 23, i would say he's an a-plus swimmer. he made the call and gsh gshth

out there and get the victim on his surf board. he saved these two people, got hem out further -- them out further out away from the surf, and the coast guard picked them up. i want to commend firefighter jeffreys. he did a great job. cliff rescue, i was going to give you a presentation, but i know we're constrained by time. the missing dog of ford funston, we got the dog off the cliff. the owner was very grateful. >> president nakajo: chief gonzales, i know that you are

constrained by time in the room, but we don't have to go until 12:15. before you finish your report, chief hayes-white has an item that she wanted to finish with her report, and then we'll go back to your report. >> thank you. >> commissioner hayes-white: thank you very much, president nakajo. i just want today say good the geary report, this became an investigation conducted by the ntsb. so the city of san francisco was named as a party to the investigation, which i signed off on confidential disclosure agreements and so forth, but i did want to acknowledge assistant deputy chief mike cochran who i designated as representing the department. and he spent without a lot of notice, friday and saturday and sunday evening making effort to coordinate that, as well as chief rex hale participating in

some of the interviews. i just wanted to reiterate that. >> president nakajo: thank you very much. chief gonzales, we have a little bit of time. i don't want to rush you in terms of your report because there is information we wanted to share. and colleagues, by your leave, i will start to leave about five to. thank you very much. continue, chief gonzales. >> thank you, mr. president. multiple outreach is still going on, surf messages, bicyclists, pedestrian traffic, etc. reminder to the public, close your door before you doze. i'll show you the quick presentation, powerpoint.

cleanup some of these other proposals that are on here. >> commissioner hayes-white: did you want did you want to go to the laptop? >> yes, please. this is my operation report for january. the community outreach at st. anthony's career day. multiagency training, as the chief mentioned, alcatraz. s.f.o. division live fire training, this is where they do live fire training.

january district safety fair. we did, i believe, nine of these events in the last month. this is the first alarm fire that i was discussing that happened on connecticut street. as you can see, a.d.c. cochran is also there with batallion chief thompson. a.d.c. cochran responds to almost all of our fires without question. you could have a fire on polk and eddy, and he'd be there. this was one of our busiest fires that we were at. they took the time to assuage this little girl from vufr, who was upset because the bells were going off. you can see her smiling there, so good job. this was a stove fire.

the family had a newborn, they fixed the roast, and got it back in the oven, cooking. it was customer service. this was a c.p.r. training at headquarters. thank you very much to the c.p.r. division and health division that handled that. part of the outreach, coastal outreach, outreach. there's the little dog that was out there 26 hours that they saved. happy dog, happy owner. pier three, bay rescue. good job by the members there. and as usual, any questions, i'm available for questions and also follow sffd on facebook,

twitter, inst -- instagram, periscope, and of course on our website, sffd.org. >> commissioner covington: thank you, chief gonzales. is there any public comment on the chief's report? no, thank you. then i will go to my fellow commissioners, beginning with commissioner veronese. >> commissioner veronese: chief, thank you for your report. the fire that was on parker and geary street. obviously, there was some length of time that it took to get the gas shutoff. we're not addressing that here, but i imagine had that break-in the line been directed toward the building, we would have had a very different type of fire. i'm wondering, with all the

discussions going on with pg&e being able to access shutoffs, i just want to make sure that the fire department has a voice in whatever conversations are going on, as i imagine it does and you keep the commission updated. i believe it was almost one-third of our department members were working on that fire. about ten stations worth of people. if we've got a big earthquake and have two or three of those, it's a very different snar joe. so if you could keep us updates on these conversations, that would be great. >> absolutely. i'm one of the 24-7 responders to be able to respond to these fires in a much more expedient manner. in some cases, they've stepped up, and in some cases, they just don't have it. when it comes to these gas

breaches, oftentimes, it has to do with where these maps are ad. it's not just one shutoff that's identified. we don't know where those shutoffs would be just by coming up -- we know where the building shutoff is to put the buildingoff, but not the conventional shutoff when the building line is broken. i didn't make that call. i was away on vacation, but the main concern was trying to save as many buildings as we could and obviously life safety. thankfully, nobody get killed at this fire. once they were able to put the lines in place to protect the structures that were left, it was just a matter of look, now you have to be safe turning it off. we don't want to have anybody killed turning it off.

but i absolutely agree with you. those conversations about still move forward, and i will continue to update you. >> commissioner veronese: these days, the way technology is, i can shut off the water at my house 6,000 miles away on my phone, but pg&e, i'm sure it's much more complicated when it comes to gas. >> when the big one happens, if the big one happens, the plan has always been, look, once there's a certain amount of damage or certain degree on the richter scale, i would like to see all the gas in san francisco until we figure it out shutdown. it's -- it's -- on the other hand, there was -- in this record d regar-- regard, i was

this fire, but it was three or four buildings. i'm sure they weighed their consideration, whatever they did that day, but of paramount concern is the safety of our public, our personnel, and pg&e personnel. >> commissioner veronese: i appreciate the statistics that you have on page 11, 12, and 13. if you could just do me a favor and add to the bottom of that, a total, so if we can track whether or not this is trending up or down. i just added the numbers together rkts a together, and admittedly, i'm no good at math, but it looks like the calls were up to until 40 now, and i'm just wondering -- i want to make sure we're tracking this issue.

because if we're seeing an up tick in these types of calls, we should be using this information to ask questions as to why we're seeing an uptake. >> well, the numbers are on page 11. i'm not sure if we're talking about the same number, but it's itemized, obviously, to e.m.s. six, fire incidents, and medical incidents. >> commissioner veronese: yeah. i added up all the noes, and i added up all the yeses in those two columns, and then divided the noes and found it's 38.8%. so we're up until 2% from where we were. >> so the medical incidents -- i'm not disputing what you're saying. the medical incidents, there's 2761 no, and 5841 yes. they're basing it on those numbers, not adding the rest. >> commissioner veronese: where are you? >> i'm on page 11, at the bottom. i look at the medical incidents

as opposed to the fire incidents. the fire incidents, they're just -- there's not many. the m.s.-6 incidents, they work with a unique demographic. think go to the repeat -- they go to the repeat callers. i look at the medical number, and that's 5841 that were -- 272 2761 that were noes and 5641 that was yeses. >> commissioner veronese: if you add up all the numbers, and you don't -- >> i can add august through january and figure out the percentage. >> >> commissioner veronese: yes. i added that up, and it's going up. and we need to be asking why, because if it's going down, we need to be patting ourselves on the back.

>> thank you. >> commissioner covington: thank you, commissioner veronese. commissioner hardeman? >> commissioner hardeman: were you next? i think commissioner cleaveland was next. >> commissioner covington: i see your name is next, commissioner cleaveland. and i also see that the chief of the department has something to add. >> commissioner hayes-white: thank you, vice president covington. i just wanted to add to chief gonzales's comment to commissioner veronese. we meet with pg&e. we meet with them quarterly. i think we missed this last time because there's been a change in leadership, but i personally reached out to pg&e and the interim c.e.o., mr. john simon, and we had a conversation the very next day about some constructive feedback that we had. as part of the action and review that we had yesterday, pg&e was there due to the

elements of the ntsb investigation, and the results of their report in four to six weeks come out, some of that is privileged, but the good news is it'll be a very comprehensive and thorough report. thank you. >> commissioner covington: thank you, chief. all right. commissioner cleaveland? >> commissioner cleaveland: thank you, madam -- thank you, madam vice president. carrying on on the geary-parker incident, and i'm encouraged, chief, to hear that we hopefully will get a copy or the commission will have access to the ntsb's final report when they come out with the final recommendations. but i question if we have -- does the fire department have a map of the gas lines in the city? do we know where the potential vulnerable parts are, vulnerable connections are?

do we have any sort of access to information on -- on when work is going to be done on a street that could involve working around or over or under our gas lines? >> we do have mapping available, and we have seen those maps, i can have a. a.c. stougherty or baker come up. so they have water on the system, but we can work on getting that for them. i'm not going to tell them to rely on that -- they're not going to try to mitigate that situation on geary and parker. >> commissioner cleaveland: right. we have no control over the gas lines, and we have no legal right to touch them at all, correct? >> no, we can shut -- we've gone to residence, and if we

can shut it down from the street. if it's a hazard, we'll shut it off. the fires, if we're not there, we'll send utilities to go, but that's precautionary. >> commissioner cleaveland: it's a partnership, of course. >> right shaef. >> commissioner cleaveland: on the postal safety signage issue, do you think all the signage is adequate? >> it could be improved, but i would say compare today what we had a few years ago, it's leaped and bounds ahead. i think we could use some more signage out on the cliffs. i think we could work with n.p.r., as well as g.g.r.a. >> commissioner cleaveland: exactly. have we voiced any concern about the signage in the golden

gate recreation area? commissioner veronese commented that we should get poison ivy and plant it on the cliff, don't go an additional 3 feet to the edge of the cliff because there's poison oak there. that would convince the casual hiker not to go to the cliff. >> it's a -- yeah, it's tough. i mean, it's -- i have -- i've been out to land's end, and there are -- obviously, there's ropes, and they say don't go past this. you do take your life -- you risk your life sometime out there when you go past the lines that are established already. >> commissioner cleaveland: i wanted to commend you and lieutenant baxter and the deputy for the fire safety

fairs that you've been putting on. one of my things coming on board in 2013 as a commissioner was we needed to do more outreach to the community. we needed to educate the community, you know, from seniors down to elementary school kids on how to prevent fires, and i think we're doing a fantastic job. >> it was inspired by you. >> commissioner cleaveland: i don't want to take the credit. i'm happy that we're doing that. >> i want to give you credit. i was at that commission meeting when you said, what do we do for outreach, and i didn't have an answer, honestly. we did some outreach, but since then, it has been compounded. there's so much outreach now. >> commissioner cleaveland: i commend you and commend lieutenant baxter who i think is doing a bangup job. >> you actually taught me what outreach is. i knew a hose fire. that's all i knew.

thank you. >> commissioner cleaveland: thank you. >> commissioner covington: thank you, commissioner cleaveland. commissioner hardeman? >> commissioner hardeman: yes, chief gonzales, always a good report. i can't remember so many water incidents reported this month. there was a lot of things reported concerning water. >> more bad weather concerning that, as well. >> commissioner hardeman: when i was working full-time, pg&e had 7,000 members -- 17,000 members, and they were very active in the union movement. the geary incident, it took so long, and then, to find out it was just a system problem, shutoff valves, it seems. and then, the precautions you have to take when said happens. then, i also fou