struggling with self-harm ideations and depression, and we connected them with a therapist and community group. these experiences are common across all eight of the school's we work at -- of the schools we work at. there needs easily fall through the cracks under the school system where the ratio of social workers to students is one per 100 students, and one school councillor per 500 students. our students deserve better than this. in middle school groups, youth are actively involved in learning tools and practices to ensure safety, self compassion, supported communities, and connectedness as students to navigate trauma of homophobia and trans phobia each day. a past q. group student recently served on the school district's council. we have seen increases in confidence and higher comfortability in many of our nonbinary and transgender identities.

many of our students that we work with regularly attend community groups and access therapy at lyric. lgbtq youth ages 12-14 are critical in development and need lgbt competent support services to be vital for the resiliency and adulthood. thank you. [applause] >> hi. i am a brick program manager at lyric serving lgbtq youth and young adults in the castro in district eight. as a trans man who grew up in oakland, i know the importance of growing this leadership. i'm calling on the board of supervisors to show their investment in and support for our transit adults and experiencing some of the highest levels of disparity. we know stability is precarious, yet they continue to show up for themselves and for each other. one morning i found a fellow sleeping on the porch after having to leave the physical abuse in their home.

i took this fellow to the emergency shelter in this city they were living. another fellow who briefly served in the military was kicked out as a teenager. as a fellow, she has moved three times in a single year to find safe and accessible housing. this same fellow cannot find a sliding scale his therapist to understand trans identities and dissociative disorders. we have an obligation to support and uplift trans youth 18 to 24 who are at a critical moment in the development that will set the stage for the rest of their adulthood. they did not have the support like q. groups as adolescents, and school bullying and family rejection carries with them into their adult lives. lyric fellows are actively involved in serving their communities. fellows work with trans elders and lgbtq youth and they worked on the homeless youth count, and they share their stories for advocacy videos. one fellow even serves on the s.f. youth commission. another spoke on disability at a national conference. one fellow was assigned to

community hip-hop level, -- label, and another will have a short film and pride this year. the fellowship is about growing leaders to ensure that trans young adults have a voice in the conversations that impact their lives. we are asking you to value trans leadership and can you -- continue funding the fellowship in the amount of $200,000. this commitment will not only offer stability for trans youth, but also demonstrate a commitment to equity. we are asking the board of supervisors -- >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> i am here to call on the board to adequately fund an nco so nonprofits can provide equitable play pay and an equitable pay scale. i am the executive director of peer resources where youth -- we are youth leadership organization. we serve hundreds of san francisco city youth across the city. like many other nonprofit c.b.o.

in the city, we are creating intentional paths to opportunity for our san francisco youth, and that is specifically meaning careers that meet development and nonprofit in the city, careers to give back and keep giving back to the city. this means that as a snapshot and peer resources go into careers as youth workers, as educators, and they continue to be here in the city. right now in my nonprofit staff, 83% of my staff are san francisco unified graduates, they stayed and found ways to stay. they are all people of color, many of them have lived through public housing, all of them have changed hundreds and thousands of young people's lives. so when we look at m.c.o., this is about young people needing to know that there is a path to a future, not just a higher minimum wage, but a path beyond that higher minimum wage where they can continue to serve the

community. i ask you to see the m.c.o. as part of a bigger picture of helping development and healthy community development that many of us are speaking about in the nonprofit industry. we need your support. you can either deferred the pain of income inequality in the city , or eradicate that pain for those who are serving the community and nonprofits. help us, allow us to fully implement the intention of m.c.o. thanks. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> hello, my name is michelle. i am the executive director of the richmond neighborhood center thank you for this opportunity. it does seem to be city government at its best. thank you for listening to us in advocating for us. the neighborhood center runs youth programs at nine public schools. we run food pantries as well and community programs. we have 150 staff members, 25-30

our high school youth workers. we have a 5 million-dollar budget, mostly city funds, of which we are very grateful for. we are in full support of a minimum wage increase, and we ask the board of supervisors to address the true budgetary impacts on nonprofits. as an organization, the richmond neighborhood center program have long operated with the intent to maximize city and state dollars of direct staffing costs to provide the highest quality programs to the greatest number of students. as an organization that plays a key role in providing programs that meet the needs of child care, high-quality enrichment, academic support, identity-based programming, and youth workforce development, we see our role as integral to the functioning both our schools and our community as a whole. with an array of subsidized programs, and many of our schools, we fully recognize that often we are the only free or low-cost option for families most in need. for just our youth program

through sfusd, we have received $3.3 million. of which, to put $1 million is dedicated to salaries alone. an increase of 10% of our salaries would result in a 215,000-dollar increase in our organization salary costs to address wage compensation -- wage compression and equity across the board. thank you. >> next speaker. >> thank you for the opportunity my name is robert, i'm the high school program director. i just wanted to give a little oversight into how this will impact our programming. much of the funds that we get our to support students and academics, and in order to do that, we are rooted in youth development, and that comes with providing a safe and supportive environments, and building relationships. as we look at this, we are really looking at having to

consolidate programs, we are looking at cutting the visions and potential hours for our and our employees which impacts the relationships that we are able to build with students, so we please ask you to help. thanks. >> thank you very much. next speaker. >> thank you. my name is chris, i'm the deputy director with the richmond neighborhood center. i also serve as a cochair for the department, children youth and family service provider working group. my colleagues did in excellent job of outlining why it is so critical that we fully fund the m.c.o., especially as it pertains to wage compression. i also want to advocate for how important this is for families. from figure 2018 to february 2019, according to the u.s. bureau of labor and statistics consumer pricing index, the cost of childcare,

education, and enrichment support went up 11-point 1%. that is second only to alcohol in the san francisco area. what this tells us is that if we don't fully fund the m.c.o., we know it will affect negatively both access and the cost of childcare programming for families. we know that for many of our families, childcare is a difference between having a job or not having a job. it is the difference between having somebody at a school site who can help with homework, when maybe there is a language barrier at home. it is a difference between students having a snack after school, or not having a snack after school. these are very critical services that we need to fully support and invest in, because it is important we consider an 11.1% increase for childcare says something about us as a city. it says something about what we value as a community, and it is

important that we say that we do value our children, youth, and families in the city, and we will fully fund it so they have both access to high-quality and low-cost programs. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> hello. thank you for listening to our stories today. my name is april. i'm a member of local 29, and i am a case manager at hamilton families, and a program where my wages are not dictated by a city contract. i'm happy to be here with my union members and nonprofit partners. i'm not proud, however, as being paid more than my coworkers at the shelter. i don't work any harder than them, nor serve a vastly different population. i certainly haven't been doing it for longer. some shelter staff up in there for over a decade. it is a very real consequence considering where we live. i'm asking you today to recognize the value of, and more

importantly properly compensate my coworkers who have committed their lives to serving our community. thank you. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, chair, supervisors. i am a union representative with local 29 where i have the honour of representing folks who work at the msc south shelter, the e.c.s. shelters, the hamilton family shelters, the hospitality house shelters, along with many other shops, you have heard our folks here today talking to you about the important work they do and the challenges they face. we are here asking you to fully fund the m.c.o. for all the reasons laid out before you, eloquently by my sisters and brothers. i wanted to focus in on one of the factors that we are asking you to think deeply about, and that is the compression.

many of the folks who are working in the shelter system, while their wages on paper may be a minimum wage, in reality, over time, with longevity increases and the cost of doing business increases that has been brought forward by the city, many of those folks make just above 17, or just above $18. just as we raise the lowest tier , those folks will be sitting right there above new employees walking through the door, so my union sister here came up with me because she knows i don't like to speak in public, it is very difficult for me. i wanted to give you an example of where the compaction factor really will make a difference, this is nurse and one, she has been a union member and an employee at the medical respite

for 20 years. she makes 1666 in our with her next rays coming up, she will make just over 17. and if compaction is not funded, her employer -- >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, board members , and speaking on behalf of community housing partnership where i am the director of director public policy and community organizing. i just want to point out before i start, that this issue has unified employers and employees, labour, and management who are and the same page with this, which is that we need funding for the minimum compensation ordinance. that is not nothing. we are here speaking in favor of that ordinance. the full funding, because city

funded nonprofits do vitally important work to address the critical issues facing the city. we provide housing to the poorest, mental healthcare to the uninsured, drug treatment, dog -- job training, and an array of other services most close to the edge and our community. without adequate funding to support these wage increases, this would amount to budget cuts for the organizations that perform these vital services where the need is only increasing. i'm afraid these services would suffer. the last thing that the city needs is a reduction or disruption of exactly these types of services. also, to not provide full funding would undermine the very spirit of the ordinance, which the voters approved since squeezing the budget, a very lean organization will invariably lead to impact on staff wages and will ultimately could wage -- lead to wage

stagnancy, higher increases or what layoffs for other people or everyone involved, so we support full funding, not just because it is the right thing to do to support workers, but also because we are housing organizations, we are affordable housing providers, and this is a housing issue as much as anything else, workers can't live in s.f. envelope $1,650 -- on below $6.50. thank you. >> my name is and james. i am a member of the presbyterian church on the color of terror vale and funston. i am speaking for church women united which is a coalition of a women church groups. we have supported the efforts of the living wage coalition to raise the salaries and the wages

of low-wage workers, and we strongly urge you to listen to these people who are doing such wonderful things for the city of san francisco and helping so many people, and it is very worthwhile to help them do their good work. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> hello. my name is james birch, and i'm from st. james infirmary. we are a peer-based sex worker health clinic in the city. we have been doing outreach for several years in an attempt to provide education and services to sex workers in the region, and we are here with a budget proposal that affects the collaboration of other members.

are parties recognize that those trading sex in the mission are underserved, and all parties are clear that the first priorities are current curtailed violence while the outreach of assessed needs. you will see clearly that this is what this proposal does. at st. james infirmary, we provide outreach services in the city. what we have heard loud and clear is our outdoor sex workers who work in the mission mission are among the most underserved. it is our hope to expand our services, allowing work in the mission to continue to serve as a model for the city as a whole and for the state. i look forward to providing the supervisors with analysis regarding our existing program that will demonstrate the success of our outreach thus far and. >> supervisor fewer: might sex work in the mission as a citywide issue, and show how additional funding could provide a significant benefit. in closing, i know that you are all keenly aware of the unique value that st. james provides to the city of san francisco. what we are asking for is an opportunity to continue to do

the work that put san francisco at the forefront with respect to best practices for the sex worker rights movement. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> hi, my name is sylvia and i'm here in support for the budget proposal for addressing violence related to sex work in the mission. i'm here as a staff of st. james infirmary, and i am part of the h.i.v. services program and i may. councillor. i am also a mission resident. i am part of the mission neighborhood group. i am also a former sex worker. in my experience as part of st. james, our late-night van outreach as part of a unique effort to compassionately and nonviolently create a report with folks who are living and working on the street.

many who are houseless and rely solely on street-based work to support themselves and their families. i believe this is a time where we could be creating options for our most vulnerable population instead of always defaulting to police intervention, poverty should not be a crime. this budget proposal is a step in the right direction. we should be creating a model for a citywide issue for the expanded budget to give resources to street workers for safer sex tools, access to free medical services, free mental health services, vouchers for a bed to sleep in, training for our community for community-based conflict intervention based on respect and mutual aid. thank you. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> hello, i am a mission

resident, and i recently started meeting with the mission neighbours in response to a lot of the gentrification and persecution of violence against sex workers that has been happening in the neighborhood. i just want to say that it is not just about sex workers, it is not just about sex work. this is not who these people are these people are from the bay area and have been here for a long time, most of them are now homeless or have been pushed out it is also a homeless issue, and it is just about people trying to survive and trying to stay where they are at, and there has been a lot of violence perpetrated against them at the hands of police, among other things, so they don't feel safe interacting with the police and it is not the best alternative to how police -- interference, so i think the work of this st. james infirmary and the neighbours are really fighting for the people who made this city what it is.

there is there's a long history of cap's street as they call it. a rich history of sex work happening there. and i know there's a lot of stigma surrounding this topic. is something people don't like to discuss, but it is an all-encompassing topic. and it affects the entire city. this people from all over the bay who come to the neighborhood to work and we just want to have alternatives for them to only be on the street if they are choosing to be an to have a place to go, and resources that will actually help them. thank you. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> hello there. my name is tessa brown. i'm a founding member of the mission neighbours. thank you for your time. i'm here with some of my other neighbours and members of the st. james infirmary asking for your support for a budget proposal that we have worked on with supervisor ronen's office for increased funding to do outreach, and also data

collection with sex workers in the mission, there have been calls for increased policing to deal with street-based sex workers, but we know that policing doesn't make sex work go away, or would be gone already. sex workers are working out of poverty and policing arresting -- police arresting them makes it more dangerous for them and their families. a lot of sex workers have children, and are supporting their family members. we are asking for your consideration for the budget proposal that was created with lots of different neighborhood groups in the mission that all were able to agree on the need for increased outreach, increased van outreach services, a coordinator that can help manage all of that, and also -- there was something else, but it is in a proposal. we have been walking around this morning, we have met with aids in each of your offices, so you eat should have a copy of the

budget proposal. james from st. james also is going to prepare more data for you on the wonderful work that st. james and safe house of done already, and why it is proven effective to reach out to sex workers. we really appreciate your support and your time, and we hope you'll keep investing in protecting san francisco's most vulnerable citizens. thank you. >> next speaker, please. >> i am cesar and i'm a sex worker. i'm here in support and asking for least $400,000 for -- mostly in the mission, but i think this should be citywide outreach. emergency housing, violence prevention, let's see here, and those are the things. in 1996, the task force concluded that the city spends -- in excess of $7.6 million annually enforcing prostitution in san francisco.

if we were enforcing this law, we would be saving this amount of money, which we should be putting towards funding the wages for these nonprofits, as well as finding housing, as well as funding many different things , so i'm here to ask for the budget requests and also to look at our laws as well if we were to actually decriminalize as a city, to stop enforcing prostitution. we would not only save people's money, but save people's time. inviting a crime -- laws that are unjust. i will be coming to all the offices and introducing an amended version of proposition k. from 2008 which will stop the police department from enforcing prostitution laws. i look forward to working with you. thank you. >> next speaker, please.

>> i am speaking on behalf of of latinas which is the only latina group in the tenderloin. it is a parliament group by the infirmary. i am a worker. the tenderloin in the mission have the highest population of trans women of color engaged in prostitution. and sex work is work. we need to better our community. we need to be there. i'm proud to be a prostitute. i cannot get a job. even i have a bachelors in marketing. the point is this.

we are an investment on the community. if you invest in us, we will produce, we will produce and we will be good citizens, we will be a great community, that $400,000 that we are asking for, please, please, do so. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> hello. my name is mary lopez, and i'm here to support the st. james infirmary request for $400,000. sex workers are always an under resourced community. they are always incredibly stigmatized, which means they are the least likely to reach out from law -- law enforcement for help. we also know that very often, law enforcement is guilty of rape and sex trafficking of workers who searched for help,

which is a wise st. james infirmary is so important, and we defendant -- depend on them so much to keep the citizens and people in the city safe, which is why the work that they do is so important, another point i would like to bring up is the fact that since -- sex trafficking has increased by 760 %. that would only be possible if six work -- sex workers are able were able to do the work consensually were moved into sex trafficking because of the law, which is why the st. james infirmary is important that they intersect policy, outreach, sex work, and sex trafficking. if we are as opposed to sex trafficking is a community as we claim to be, then the only option is to support sex workers and is to support the request for the budget proposal. inc. you.

>> good afternoon, madam chair and supervisors. my name is connie ford and as you probably know, i have been around for very long time, and very excited to be here today. because it is a triangle that we have been working on. we have in working for decades to try to get nonprofit workers up. we have been working decades to get the minimum wage up which we have, and now through all of the good work, we have the m.c.o. right up there, and lastly, this wage compression and equity issue has always been there. we have never really addressed it, and now we have the chance to address it. you have heard from all of the sisters and brothers here, is a member of the organization for many decades, and a leader at one time, we always felt like the heart and soul of our membership was the nonprofit workers. they do god's work, if you will. they do the work that we all need to be doing. we support the homeless service

providers and all the other nonprofits. they take care of all of the other things. without these nonprofit workers, our city would not be, and have the values that we have. it is very important to complete this picture of the triangle to make all of these workers feel appreciated, to feel respected. i don't have to tell you that many of the workers they have heard today have been here 20 years, 15 years. they are waiting to get their due, and most of them for their long-term are making more than $16.50. most of them are making 18 or 19 or $20. they need this wage compression to feel honoured why the city to doing the very hard work that they do. i urge you to do. i think all the labour for doing what they do, and i'm proud to be here. i remember why i am proud to be a member and i'm glad to be here to really do the right thing,

which i hope you are going to advocate and i appreciate it. thank you. >> hello, i work with conard house. we provide housing, mental health services to the vulnerable communities in san francisco. i want to say that i fully support the m.c.o. and the recommendation to consider the wage impact and issues, we have -- we are struggling for a while now to recruit chain managers and direct service staff to provide services towards our vulnerable population and our vulnerable citizens in san francisco. i really encourage you to consider the wage compact issues

it does have a direct impact on our staff and our ability to provide services, and in the end , our ability to provide good , quality services to all of our residents in san francisco. thank you. >> hello, good afternoon. i am with the asian-pacific islander legal outreach. we are a legal aid in san francisco and oakland. i'm the project manager for an antitrafficking project. i'm here to support the $400,000 for sex worker services in the mission district. throughout the course of our work in their work in the past 20 years, we have seen that focus engaging -- folks engaging in sex trade do not have a unilateral experience. due to the criminalize nature forced upon individuals in the industry, this exposes sex workers to discrimination -- discrimination, abuse. we believe that the extent it is

the most extensive way to help safety for sex workers and a budget is -- our community members in district six which include sex workers need safety, protection, and to be treated with dignity. sex workers are increasingly targeted by harmful policies and enforced by public and private institutions. this puts workers at increased economic vulnerability. we need them to stabilize their economic services. the answer is not to arrestor criminalize but provide support and options through the budget. thank you. >> good afternoon, my name is teresa. i am an employment case manager. i work at hospitality house. i am an op i local 29 member. i fully supports the moc, you

know, i worked two jobs for a lot of years and, you know, i got so burnt out a lot of people who make minimum wage, they all have to work two jobs or move out of san francisco, so they are not there for their families , you know, so, you know , hold on. especially the -- especially the desk clerk, they are on the front lines, even though they do not have a degree, they are therapists and they are also security where they are at risk, their safety is at risk. you know, i just feel like, you know, people in the front lines especially need to make more

money because, you know, also we keep coming back to work because we are compassionate, you know, a lot of us have been there. i have been homeless, on drugs, 25 years, and now it is my passion to help others. i also ask that you prioritize employment services for homeless jobseekers, as well as barriers. thank you. >> good afternoon, supervisors. hospitality house. i'm fully in support of the investment and the minimum compensation ordinance, and we are proud of our 25 year relationship with the organization, and we consider ourselves to be a good employer. there are a number of organizations around the city

who would fit that mantle, and it is an opportunity here for the board to consider this investment, this series of investments that we are making in the civic infrastructure. i would put a couple of other things on the list for consideration. the idea of a multiemployer retirement plan and a nonprofit section. is institution membership based rather than independent membership-based. when nonprofits have delayed payments through the city system , many nonprofits are increasingly taking they are using public resources for for-profit entities. it is not good business practice we also have an opportunity here to throw down the mental to

responsible corporate partners in the city. this is how we are going to do business in this town. it is an opportunity to think bigger about investing in our workforce to really have a partnership with labour, to potentially call off bad actors in the labour movement when they're not fulfilling civic responsibility, and to also invest in longer-range initiatives like employment services or homeless -- for job homeless jobseekers that leverage investments that we are making in housing and services to combat homelessness, and to predict what our workers needs are going to be. >> thank you. >> my name is michael and i am the director of the human rights organization in san francisco, i want to also support the ordinance and the request for that investment and we work with

a very low income and homeless veterans. we have a drop in program, we have housing. the city has asked us to do a tough job, and we have about 200 staff the hair really work super hard to do that to take care of our veterans and we have operated in being able to pay what is needed, so people don't have to travel from brentwood. we have a lot of issues around because of increased cost of living and so forth. these are obvious things, so the impact of this investment and the suppression would really go a long way to this really crucial work that the workers

are doing and they are saving people his lives every day in san francisco, and people -- they're keeping the city operating. i want to support that. >> thank you very much. next speaker, please. >> my name is richard. i'm the executive director of clifford house. i agree with the full funding for the m.c.o. and the compaction and the impaction around the equity issue. there's no question that these are sorely needed. i agree with the approach that was taken by the working group. i think it was a good outcome that is now before you. i just want to draw your attention to something that i feel like is breaking the glass ceiling that we have been struggling with for years. connie mentioned it when she was talking about the triangle. the fact that this is indexed on cbi is one of the most significant things i have seen happen in the 24 years that i

have been doing this in san francisco. the reason it is important is because everybody locks into the idea that we could all survive on a two-point 5% cost of doing business increase. we always pass that through to employees, including having minimum wage workers. there's a whole organization wage scale based on 2.5%. let me tell you what that costs. the actual c.p.i. over the seven years is a locked figure, it has actually caused us, most of the staff reduction moving from the time where we had 212 employees, down to 155, so not doing indexing shrinks staff over time mine has been reduced by 25%, actually 27% over seven years.

we can't continue to do business that way. indexing is part of the m.c.o. and the compaction. is absolutely an essential feature of this recommendation. thank you. >> thank you very much. next speaker. >> hello, supervisors. thank you for holding this hearing. i'm here to support for funding of the m.c.o. impact on community-based nonprofit. that number is $27 million in the final report, about 13 million each for vertical and horizontal equitable rates, and some from direct cost. the city has been relying more and more on our sector to serve homelessness and other populations. we have an influx of money. where are those workers going to come from to do that work if we can't recruit people and we can't pay enough to keep people?

the lack of funding would destabilize organizations and threaten their ability to provide services. some of the cities of the working group wanted to present with a range of possible costs, and the working group responded, no, the working group was tasked with looking at how organizations will actually have to respond in the real world to increase of $16.50, and the came up with $27 million. that is what it would cost and that is what we are asking you for. i also want to point out, just to point out everyone understands this request for m.c.o. funding, it is separate and distinct from an additional request to fund the cost of doing business increase. we don't want to see one pitted against each other and that cost of doing business increased needs to be inflation-based. nonprofits have been chronically

underfunded for years with sub- inflation costs of doing business increases. organizations with blended funding have not received the increase on the full amount, and organizations are faced with the rent increases in healthcare costs that are much higher than what we get in the cost of doing business. in terms of supporting us -- >> thank you very much. anymore public speakers? seeing non, public comment is closed. supervisor ronen? >> thank you so much. i just wanted to speak and respond to a full of the public -- if you've the public comics that took place today asking the mayor to fund a new program to address violence related to sex trafficking and street sex work in the mission. i really wanted to thank everyone who came out to speak on this particular issue. the budget requests of the mayor is a result of an innovative collaboration between mission residence, victims of sex trafficking, service providers, and advocates for sex workers,

including st. james infirmary, safe house, and young women freedom center. for many years we've seen a cat and mouse game play out in the mission when it comes to sex trafficking and sex work. responses always been about the police arresting pimps, john's, and sex workers for sex trafficking survivors. in recent years, the department reports a primary focus is on arresting john's and pimps. there has been very limited success to this enforcement driven model and reducing violence on the streets. police come in full force to arrest -- rsr made, and everyone goes -- everything goes back to the way it was. their shootings, stabbings, kidnap attempts, loud screening fights and more.

the survivor population takes a long time for trust to be built, and a lot more frequent outreach and offering of services to build rapport and to establish trust. therefore the collaborators came up with this cumbrian subprogram to really address the needs of the populations, made up of vulnerable folks who live throughout the city and even outside of the city. the requests involves three parts, number 1, intensive based street outreach, multiple nights a week, as well as early in the morning. number 2, emergency lodging vouchers to provide to survivors and sex workers who are unsafe -- and -- unsafely safe place to stay for permanent housing or shelters. finally, three, of violence prevention systems coordinator who is tracking the services who are being use in collecting data on what is working, and correlating across organizations

and sectors to ensure combat ability. for example, to make sure that programs focus on gang violence are aware of gender-based violence and have sex work intersects with organized crime. it is the only district-based priority i gave to the mayor. this is an innovative way to ensure safety and security for residential neighborhoods, for street sex workers, and for sex trafficking survivors who desperately need support and i really appreciate the committee for considering this request. thank you. >> thank you. >> i see no other names on the roster. i want to say thank you to everyone for sitting through this very long hearing to share your thoughts with us. i think when we pass the m.c.o., we use -- we knew this part of it would be complicated. it would take a lot of collaboration, it would take a lot of volunteer hours, quite

frankly, on everyone who participated on this committee, and it meant that a lot of people had to come together, including city government. i just want to say that i think we heard your voices here. many of us have worked in the nonprofit sector for a lot of years in our lives. and i know many of you -- i worked also for a nonprofit, and i have done those jobs where i was a cocktail waitress. i do a lot of those jobs were you probably need to work two jobs to survive. i also want to say that san francisco, we have always had rich people here, but we have never had this. we have never had a gap like this. i understand when you say it is hard to retain workers, and when workers say it is hard to put food on the table, and quite frankly, even when we talk about

$6.50 an hour or $18 an hour, it is completely heartbreaking. it is not even at a living wage in san francisco. it was such a hard fight to actually pass that. i want to say thank you to everyone who work so hard on this committee. thank you for coming today. this was a very long hearing. thank you again to our controller, and also to everyone who served on this committee representing the workers and the nonprofits of san francisco and for the work that you do every day to support the residents of san francisco. any other comments, questions? seeing none, is it any other business before us today. >> would you like to take action on this item. >> i think i would like to continue this item, please to the call of the chair. >> is there a second? >> second. >> we can take that without

objection. thank you, madame clerk. >> there is no further business. >> that is great. meeting adjourned. >> i view san francisco almost as a sibling or a parent or something. i just love the city. i love everything about it. when i'm away from it, i miss it like a person. i grew up in san francisco kind of all over the city. we had pretty much the run of

the city 'cause we lived pretty close to polk street, and so we would -- in the summer, we'd all all the way down to aquatic park, and we'd walk down to the library, to the kids' center. in those days, the city was safe and nobody worried about us running around. i went to high school in spring valley. it was over the hill from chinatown. it was kind of fun to experience being in a minority, which most white people don't get to experience that often. everything was just really within walking distance, so it make it really fun. when i was a teenager, we didn't have a lot of money. we could go to sam wong's and get super -- soup for $1. my parents came here and were

drawn to the beatnik culture. they wanted to meet all of the writers who were so famous at the time, but my mother had some serious mental illness issues, and i don't think my father were really aware of that, and those didn't really become evident until i was about five, i guess, and my marriage blew up, and my mother took me all over the world. most of those ad ventures ended up bad because they would end up hospitalized. when i was about six i guess, my mother took me to japan, and that was a very interesting trip where we went over with a boyfriend of hers, and he was working there. i remember the open sewers and gigantic frogs that lived in the sewers and things like that. mostly i remember the smells very intensely, but i loved japan. it was wonderful. toward the end. my mother had a breakdown, and that was the cycle.

we would go somewhere, stay for a certain amount of months, a year, period of time, and she would inevitably have a breakdown. we always came back to san francisco which i guess came me some sense of continuity and that was what kept me sort of stable. my mother hated to fly, so she would always make us take ships places, so on this particular occasion when i was, i think, 12, we were on this ship getting ready to go through the panama canal, and she had a breakdown on the ship. so she was put in the brig, and i was left to wander the ship until we got to fluorfluora few days later, where we had a distant -- florida a few days later, where we had a distant cousin who came and got us. i think i always knew i was a writer on some level, but i kind of stopped when i became a

cop. i used to write short stories, and i thought someday i'm going to write a book about all these ad ventures that my mother took me on. when i became a cop, i found i turned off parts of my brain. i found i had to learn to conform, which was not anything i'd really been taught but felt very safe to me. i think i was drawn to police work because after coming from such chaos, it seemed like a very organized, but stable environment. and even though things happening, it felt like putting order on chaos and that felt very safe to me. my girlfriend and i were sitting in ve 150d uvio's bar, and i looked out the window and i saw a police car, and there was a woman who looked like me driving the car. for a moment, i thought i was me. and i turned to my friend and i said, i think i'm supposed to do this. i saw myself driving in this

car. as a child, we never thought of police work as a possibility for women because there weren't any until the mid70's, so i had only even begun to notice there were women doing this job. when i saw here, it seemed like this is what i was meant to do. one of my bosses as ben johnson's had been a cop, and he -- i said, i have this weird idea that i should do this. he said, i think you'd be good. the department was forced to hire us, and because of all of the posters, and the big recruitment drive, we were under the impression that they were glad to have us, but in reality, most of the men did not want the women there. so the big challenge was constantly feeling like you had to prove yourself and feeling like if you did not do a good job, you were letting down your entire gender.

finally took an inspector's test and passed that and then went down to the hall of justice and worked different investigations for the rest of my career, which was fun. i just felt sort of buried alive in all of these cases, these unsolved mysteries that there were just so many of them, and some of them, i didn't know if we'd ever be able to solve, so my boss was able to get me out of the unit. he transferred me out, and a couple of weeks later, i found out i had breast cancer. my intuition that the job was killing me. i ended up leaving, and by then, i had 28 years or the years in, i think. the writing thing really became intense when i was going through treatment for cancer because i felt like there were so many parts that my kids didn't know. they didn't know my story, they didn't know why i had a relationship with my mother, why we had no family to speak of. it just poured out of me. i gave it to a friend who is an

editor, and she said i think this would be publishable and i think people would be interested in this. i am so lucky to live here. i am so grateful to my parents who decided to move to the city. i am so grateful they did. >> i went through a lot of struggles in my life, and i am blessed to be part of this. i am familiar with what people are going through to relate and empathy and compassion to their struggle so they can see i came out of the struggle, it gives them hope to come up and do

something positive. ♪ ♪ i am a community ambassador. we work a lot with homeless, visitors, a lot of people in the area. >> what i like doing is posting up at hotspots to let people see

visibility. they ask you questions, ask you directions, they might have a question about what services are available. checking in, you guys. >> wellness check. we walk by to see any individual, you know may be sitting on the sidewalk, we make sure they are okay, alive. you never know. somebody might walk by and they are laying there for hours. you never know if they are alive. we let them know we are in the area and we are here to promote safety, and if they have somebody that is, you know, hanging around that they don't want to call the police on, they don't have to call the police. they can call us. we can direct them to the services they might need. >> we do the three one one to keep the city neighborhoods clean.

there are people dumping, waste on the ground and needles on the ground. it is unsafe for children and adults to commute through the streets. when we see them we take a picture dispatch to 311. they give us a tracking number and they come later on to pick it up. we take pride. when we come back later in the day and we see the loose trash or debris is picked up it makes you feel good about what you are doing. >> it makes you feel did about escorting kids and having them feel safe walking to the play area and back. the stuff we do as ambassadors makes us feel proud to help keep the city clean, helping the residents. >> you can see the community ambassadors. i used to be on the streets.

i didn't think i could become a community ambassador. it was too far out there for me to grab, you know. doing this job makes me feel good. because i came from where a lot of them are, homeless and on the street, i feel like i can give them hope because i was once there. i am not afraid to tell them i used to be here. i used to be like this, you know. i have compassion for people that are on the streets like the homeless and people that are caught up with their addiction because now, i feel like i can give them hope. it reminds you every day of where i used to be and where i am at now.

[roll call] >> please be a revised -- advise that director brinkman will be absent from the meeting. announcement of the prohibition of sound producing devices. sound producing electronic devices are prohibited at the meeting. any person responsible for one going off, everyone will be invited to leave the room. cell phone set on vibrate may cause microphone interference. the board request they be turned